





. V 






























'-■•? 
























•^ r- 













0* 



! : 



























<*y 






£ ^ 






**> 









+. 


































THE 



WORKS 



OF 



THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. 



COMPLETE IN ONE VOL 



NEW YORK: 
EDWARD G. TAYLOR. 

128 FULTON STREET. 

1846. 



^ 



<& 






.anga 
Duko University 



PREFACE. 



When first I went into the Church I had a curacy in the middle of Salisbury Plain. 
The Squire of the parish took a fancy to me, and requested me to go with his son to 
reside at the University of Weimar ; before we could get there, Germany became the 
seat of war, and in stress of politics we put into Edinburgh, where I remained five 
years. The principles of the French Revolution were then fully afloat, and it is im- 
possible to conceive a more violent and agitated state of society. Among the first per- 
sons with whom I became acquainted were, Lord Jeffrey, Lord Murray (late Lord Ad- 
vocate for Scotland), and Lord Brougham; all of them maintaining opinions up«n political 
subjects a little too liberal for the dynasty of Dundas, then exercising supreme power 
over the northern division of the island. 

One day we happened to meet in the eighth or ninth story or flat in Buccleugh-place, 
the elevated residence of the then Mr. Jeffrey. I proposed that we should set up a 
Review ; this was acceded to with acclamation. I was appointed Editor, and remained 
long enough in Edinburgh to edit the first number of the Edinburgh Review. The 
motto I proposed for the Review was, 

1 Tenui musam meditamur avena? 
i We cultivate literature upon a little oatmeal.' 

But this was too near the truth to be admitted, and so we took our present grave motto 
from Publius Syrus, of whom none of us,I am sure, had ever read a single line ; and so be- 
gan what has since turned out to be a very important and able journal. When I left Ed- 
inburgh, it fell into the stronger hands of Lord Jeffrey and Lord Brougham, and reached 
the highest point of popularity and success. I contributed from England many arti- 
cles, which I have been foolish enough to collect and publish with some other tracts 
written by me. 

To appreciate the value of the Edinburgh Review, the state of England at the pe- 
riod when that journal began should be had in remembrance. The Catholics were not 
emancipated — the Corporation and Test Acts were unrepealed — the Game Laws were 
horribly oppressive — Steel Traps and Spring Guns were set all over the country — 
Prisoners tried for their Lives could have no Counsel — Lord Eldon and the Court of 
Chancery pressed heavily upon mankind — Libel was punished by the most cruel and 
vindictive imprisonments — the principles of Political Economy were little understood 
— the Law of Debt and of Conspiracy were upon the worst possible footing — the 
enormous wickedness of the Slave Trade was tolerated — a thousand evils were in exis- 
tence, which the talents of good and able men have since lessened or removed ; and 
these effects have been not a little assisted by the honest boldness of the Edinburgh 
Review. 

I see very little in my Reviews to alter or repent of : I always endeavoured to fight 
against evil ; and what I thought evil then, I think evil now. I am heartily glad that 
all our disqualifying laws for religious opinions are abolished, and I see nothing in such 
measures but unmixed good and real increase of strength to our Establishment. 

The idea of danger from the extension of the Catholic religion in England I utterly deride. 
The Catholic faith is a misfortune to the world, but those whose faith it conscientiously 
is, are quite right in professing it boldly, and in promoting it by all means which the 
law allows. A physician does not say * You will be well as soon as the bile is got rid 



4 PREFACE. 

of}' but he says ' You will not be well until after the bile is got rid of.' He knows af- 
ter the cause of the malady is removed, that morbid habits are to be changed, weakness 
to be supported, organs to be called back to their proper exercise, subordinate mala- 
dies to be watched, secondary and vicarious symptoms to be studied. The physician 
is a wise man — but the anserous politician insists, after 200 years of persecution, and 
ten of emancipation, that Catholic Ireland should be as quiet as Edmonton or Tooting. 

Not only are just laws wanted for Catholic Ireland, but the just administration of 
just laws ; such as they have in general experienced under the Whig government ; and 
this system steadily persevered in will, after a lapse of time, and O'Connell, quite con- 
ciliate and civilize that long injured and irritable people. 

I have printed in this Collection the Letters of Peter Plymley. The government of 
that day took great pains to find out the author ; all that they could find was, that they 
were brought to Mr. Budd, the publisher, by the Earl of Lauderdale. Somehow or 
another, it came to be conjectured that I was that author : I have always denied it; but 
finding that I deny it in vain, I have thought it might be as well to include the Letters 
in this collection ; they had an immense circulation at the time, and I think above 20,000 
copies were sold. 

From the beginning of the century (about which time the Review began) to the 
death of Lord Liverpool, was an awful period for those who had the misfortune to en- 
tertain liberal opinions, and who were too honest to sell them for the ermine of the 
judge, or the lawn of the prelate : — a long and hopeless career in your profession, the 
chuckling grin of noodles, the sarcastic leer of the genuine political rogue — prebenda- 
ries, deans, and bishops made over your head — reverend renegadoes advanced to the 
highest dignities of the Church, for helping to rivet the fetters of Catholic and Protes- 
tant Dissenters, and no more chance of a Whig administration than of a thaw in Zem- 
bla — these were the penalties exacted for liberality of opinion at that period ; and not 
only was there no pay, but there were many stripes. It is always considered as a 
piece of impertinence in England, if a man of less than two or three thousand a year 
has any opinions at all upon important subjects ; and in addition he was sure at that 
time to be assailed with all the Billingsgate of the French Revolution — Jacobin, Level- 
ler, Atheist, Deist, Socinian, Incendiary, Regicide, were the gentlest appellations used ; 
and the man who breathed a syllable against the senseless bigotry of the two Georges, 
or hinted at the abominable tyranny and persecution exercised upon Catholic Ireland, 
was shunned as unfit for the relations of social life. Not a murmur against any abuse 
was permitted; to say a word against the suitorcide delays of the Court of Chancery, 
or the cruel punishments of the Game Laws, or against any abuse which a rich man 
inflicted, or a poor man suffered, was treason against the Plousiocracy, and was bitterly 
and steadily resented. Lord Grey had not then taken off the bearing-rein from the 
English people, as Sir Francis Head has now done from horses. 

To set on foot a Journal in such times, to contribute towards it for many years, to 
bear patiently the reproach and poverty which it caused, and to look back and see that 
I have nothing to retract, and no intemperance and violence to reproach myself with, 
is a career of life which I must think to be extremely fortunate. Strange and ludicrous 
are the changes in human affairs. The Tories are now on the treadmill, and the well- 
paid Whigs are riding in chariots ; with many faces, however, looking out of the win- 
dows, (including that of our Prime Minister,) which I never remember to have seen in 
the days of the poverty and depression of Whiggism. Liberality is now a lucrative 
business. Whoever has any institution to destroy, may consider himself as a commis- 
sioner, and his fortune as made ; and to my utter and never ending astonishment, I, an 
old Edinburgh Reviewer, find myself fighting in the year 1839, against the Archbishop 
of Canterbury and the Bishop of London, for the existence of the National Church. 

SIDNEY SMITH. 



CONTENTS 



ARTICLES ORIGINALLY PUBLISHED IN THE " EDINBURGH REVIEW." 



Dr. Parr - 

Dr. Rennel 

John Bowles 

Dr. Langford 

Archcteacon Nares 

Matthew Lewis - 

Australia 

Fievee's Letters on England 

Edgeworth on Bulls 

Trimmer and Lancaster 

Parnell and Ireland 

-Methodism 

Indian Missions 

Catholics - 

Methodism 

Hannah More 

Professional Education 

Female Education 

Public Schcols - 

Toleration 

Charles Fox 

Mad Quakers 

America - 

Game Laws 

Botany Bay 

Chimney Sweepers 

America 

Spring Guns 

Prisons • - 

Prisons ^ - ^ 

Persecuting Bishops 

Botany Bay 

Game Laws 

Cruel Treatment of untried Prisoners 

America - 

Bentham on Fallacies 

Waterton - 

Man Traps and Spring Guns 

Hamilton's Method of Teaching Languages 

Counsel for Prisoners 

Catholics ..... 

Neckar's Last Views 

Catteau, Tableau des Etats Danois 

Thoughts on the Residence of the Clergy 

Travels from Palestine - 



PAGE 
7 

9 
11 
12 
13 
14 
15 
19 
20 
21 
24 
26 



45 

\ r 48 

50 

54 

59 

62 

65 

71 

73 

79 

83 

89 

93 

102 

104 

111 

117 

122 

129 

132 

137 

142 

149 

154 

158 

165 

171 

178 

183 

190 

191 



Letter on the Curate's Salary Bill 


PAGB 

- 192 


Proceedings of the Society for the Suppressioi 
ofVice .... 


l 

■ 195 


Characters of Fox 


. 199 


Observations on the Historical Work of th< 


i 


Right Hon. Charles James Fox - 


. 20! 


Disturbances at Madras • 


• 207 


Bishop of Lincoln's Charge 
Madame d'Epinay - - 
Poor-Laws .... 


. 212 
. 215 

• 218 


Anastasius .... 


. 223 


Scarlett's Poor-Bill - - - 


. 226 


Memoirs of Captain Rock 

Granby ..... 

Island of Ceylon .... 


. 229 
■ 232 
. 236 


Delphine . . - . - 
Mission to Ashantee - - • 


■ 239 
241 


Public Characters of 1801, 1802 - 


244 


Account of New South Wales 


ib. 


Wittman's Travels - 


248 


SPEECHES. 




Speech on the Catholic Claims • 
Speech at the Taunton Reform Meeting 


251 
254 



Speech at Taunton at a Meeting to celebrate the 

Accession of King William IV. - 256 

Speech at Taunton in 1831 on the Reform Bill 

not being passed - - - 257 

Speech respecting the Reform Bill - - 258 

The Ballot 261 

First Letter to Archdeacon Singleton . 267 
Second Letter to Archdeacon Singleton - 277 
Third Letter to Archdeacon Singleton - - 283 
Letter on the Character of Sir James Mack- 
intosh ..... 287 
Letter to Lord John Russell - - - 289 - 
Sermon on the Duties of the Queen - • 291 
The Lawyer that tempted Christ : a Sermon - 293 
The Judge that smites contrary to the Law : a 

Sermon 4 - - . . 29$ 

A Letter to the Electors upon the Catholic 

Question ..... 298 

A Sermon on the Rules of Christian Charity - 307 

Peter Plymley's Letters - . - - 310 



WORKS 



OP THE 



REY. SIDIEY SMITH. 



DR. PARR.* (Edinburgh Review, 1802.) 

8pital Sermon, preached at Christ Church upon Easter- 
Tuesday, April 15, 1800. To which are added, Notes by 
Samuel Parr, LL.D. Printed for J. Mawman in the 
Poultry. 1801. 

Whoever has had the good fortune to see Dr. Parr's 
wig, must have observed, that while it trespasses a lit- 
tle on the orthodox magnitude of perukes in the ante- 
rior parts, it scorns even the Episcopal limits behind, 
and swells out into boundless convexity of frizz, the 
fteya Bavjta of barbers, and the terror of the literary 
world. After the manner of his wig, the Doctor has 
constructed his sermon, giving us a discourse of no 
lommon length, and subjoining an immeasurable mass 
of notes, which appear to concern every learned thing, 
every learned man, and almost every unlearned man 
since the beginning of the world. 

For his text, Dr. Parr has chosen Gal. vi. 10. As we 
have therefore opportunity, let us do good to all mm, espe- 
•Hally to those who are of the household of faith. After a 
preliminary comparison between the dangers of the 
selfish system, and the modern one of universal benev- 
olence, he divides his sermon into two parts : in the 
first examining how far, by the constitution of human 
nature, and the circumstances of human life, the prin- 
ciples f particular and universal benevolence are com- 
patible : in the last, commenting on the nature of the 
charitable institution for which he is preaching. 

The former part is levelled against the doctrines of 
Mr. Godwin j and, here", Dr. Parr exposes, very strong- 
ly and happily, the folly of making universal benevo- 
lence the immediate motive of our actions. As we consi- 
der this, though of no very difficult execution, to be by 
far the best part of the sermon, we shall very willingly 
make some extracts from it. 

♦To me it appears, that the modern advocates for uni- 
versal philanthropy have fallen into the error charged 
upon those who are fascinated by a violent and extraor- 
dinary fondness for what a celebrated author calls " some 
moral species." Some men, it has been remarked, are 
hurried into romantic adventures, by their excessive ad- 
miration of fortitude. Others are actuated by a head- 
strong zeal for disseminating the true religion. Hence, 
while the only properties, for which fortitude or zeal can 
be esteemed, are scarcely discernible, from the enormous 
bulkiness to which they are swollen, the ends to which 
alone they can be directed usefully, are overlooked or de- 

* A great scholar, as rude and violent as most Greek scholars 
are, unless they happen to be Bishops. He has left nothing be- 
hind him worth leaving : he was rather fitted for the law than 
the church, and would have been a more considerable man, if he 
had been more knocked about among his equals. He lived with 
country gentlemen and clergymen, who flattered and feared him 



feated ; the public good is impaired, rather than increased ; 
and the claims that other virtues equally obligatory have 
to our notice, are totally disregarded. Thus, too, when 
any dazzling phantoms of universal philanthropy have 
seized our attention the objects that formerly engaged it 
shrink and fade. All considerations of kindred, friends, 
and countrymen drop from the mind, during the struggles 
it makes to grasp the collective interests of the species ; 
and when the association that attached us to them has been 
dissolved, the notions we have formed of their compara- 
tive insignificance will prevent them from recovering, I 
do not say any hold whatsoever, but that strong and last- 
ing hold they once had upon our conviction and our feel- 
ings. Universal benevolence, should it, from any strange 
combination of circumstances, ever become, passionate, 
will like every other passion justify itself: and the impor- 
tunity of its demands to obtain a hearing will be propor- 
tionate to the weakness of its cause. But what are the 
consequences ? A perpetual wrestling for victory between 
the refinements of sophistry, and the remonstrances of in- 
dignant nature — the agitations of secret distrust in opinions 
which gain few or no proselytes, and feelings which excite 
little or no sympathy— the neglect of all the usual duties, 
by which social life is preserved or adorned ; and in the 
pursuit of other duties which are unusual, and indeed ima- 
ginary, a succession of airy projects, eager hopes, tumultu- 
ous efforts, and galling disappointments, such, in truth, as 
every wise man foresaw, and a good man would rarely 
commiserate.' 

In a subsequent part of his sermon, Dr. Parr handles 
the same topic with equal success. 

* The stoics, it has been said, were more successful in 
weakening the tender affections, than in animating men to 
the stronger virtues of fortitude and self-command ; and 
possible it is, that the influence of our modern reformers 
may be greater, in furnishing their disciples with pleas for 
the neglect of their ordinary duties, than in stimulating 
their endeavours for the performance of those which are 
extraordinary, and perhaps ideal. If, indeed, the repre- 
sentations we have lately heard of universal philanthropy 
served only to amuse the fancy of those who approve of 
them, and communicate that pleasure which arises from 
contemplating the magnitude and grandeur of a favourite 
subject, we might be tempted to smile at them as groundless 
and harmless. But they tend to debase the dignity, and to 
weaken the efficacy of those particular affections, for which 
we have daily and hourly occasion in the events of real life. 
They tempt us to substitute the ease of speculation, and 
the pride of dogmatism, for the toil of practice. To a 
class of artificial and ostentatious sentiments, they give the 
most dangerous triumph over the genuine and salutary dic- 
tates of nature. They delude and inflame our minds witn 
Pharisaical notions of superior wisdom and superior vir- 
tue ; and what is the worst of all, they may be used as '« • 
cloketo us" for insensibility, where other men feel : and 
for negligence, where other' men act with visible and uf- 
fvl, though limited, effect.' 

xn attempting to show/the connection between parti* 



WORKS OF THE REV. SIDNEY SMITH. 



cular and universal benevolence, Dr. Parr does not ap- 
pear to us to have taken a clear and satisfactory view 
of the subject. Nature impels us both to good and 
bad actions ; and even in the former, gives us no 
measure by which we may prevent them from degene- 
rating into excess. Rapine and revenge are not less 
natural than parental and filial affection ; which latter 
class of feelings may themselves be a source of crimes, 
if they overpower (as they frequently do) the sense of 
justice. It is not therefore, a sufficient justifica- 
tion of our actions, that they are natural. We 
must seek, from our reason, some principle which 
will enable us to determine what impulses of na- 
ture we are to obey, and what we are to resist : 
such is tbat of general utility, or, what is the same 
thing, of universal good ; a principle which sanctifies 
and limits the more particular affections. The duty of 
a son to a parent, or a parent 10 a son, is not an ulti- 
mate principle of morals, but depends on the principle 
of universal good, and is only praiseworthy because it 
is found to promote it. At the same time, our spheres 
of action and intelligence are so confined, that it is bet- 
ter in a great majority of instances, to suffer our con- 
duct to be guided by those affections which have been 
long sanctioned by the approbation of mankind, than to 
enter into a process of reasoning, and investigate the re- 
lation which every trifling event might bear to the gene- 
ral interests of the world. In his principle of universal 
benevolence, Mr. Godwin is unquestionably right. That 
it is the grand principle upon which* all morals rest — 
that it is the corrective for the excess of all particular 
affections, we believe to be undeniable : and he is only 
erroneous in excluding the particular affections, be- 
cause, in so doing, he deprives us of our most power- 
ful means of promoting his own principle of universal 
good ; for it is as much as to say, that all the crew ought 
to have the general welfare of the ship so much at heart, 
that no sailor should ever pull any particular rope, or 
hand any individual sail. By universal benevolence, we 
mean, and understand Dr. Parr to mean, not a barren 
affection for the species, but a desire to promote their 
real happiness j and of this principle, he thus speaks : 

<T admit and I approve of it as an emotion of which gene- 
ral happiness is the cause, but not as a passion, of which, 
according to the usual order of human affairs, it could often 
be the object. I approve of it as a disposition to wish, and, 
as opportunity may occur, to desire and do good, rather 
than harm, to those with whom we are quite unconnected.' 

It would appear, from this kind of language, that a 
desire of promoting the universal good were a pardon- 
able weakness, rather than a fundamental principle of 
ethics ; that the particular affections were incapable of 
excess ; and that they never wanted the corrective of 
a more generous and exalted feeling. In a subsequent 
part of his sermon ? Dr. Parr atones a little for this 
over-zealous depreciation of the principle of universal 
benevolence ; but he nowhere states the particular af- 
fections to derive their value and their limits from their 
subservience to a more extensive philanthropy. He 
does not show us that they exist only as virtues, from 
their instrumentality in promoting the general good ; 
and that, to preserve their true character, they should 
be frequently referred to that principle as their proper 
criterion. 

In the latter part of his sermon, Dr. Parr combats 
the general objections of Mr. Turgot to all charitable 
institutions, with considerable vigour and success. To 
say that an institution is necessarily bad, because it 
will not always be administered with the same zeal, 
proves a little too much ; for it is an objection to poli- 
tical and religious, as well as to charitable institutions ; 
and, from a lively apprehension of the fluctuating cha- 
racters of those who govern, would leave the world 
without any government at all. It is better that we 
should have an asylum for the mad, and a hospital for 
the wounded, if they were to squander away 50 per 
cent, of their income, than that we should be disgusted 
with sore limbs, and shocked by straw-crowned mon- 
archs in the streets. All institutions of this kind must 
suffer the risk of being governed by more or less of 
probity and talents. The good which one active cha- 
racter effects, and the wise order which he establishes, 



may outlive him for a long period ; and we all hate 
each other's crimes, by which we gain nothing, so 
much, that in proportion as public opinion acquires as- 
cendancy in any particular country, every public insti- 
tution becomes more and more guaranteed from abuse. 

Upon the whole, this sermon is rather the produc- 
tion of what is called a sensible, than of a very acute 
man; of a man certainly more remarkable for his 
learning than his originality. It refutes the very refu- 
table positions of Mr. Godwin, without placing the 
doctrine of benevolence in a clear light ; and it almost 
leaves us to suppose, that the particular affections are 
themseives ultimate principles of action, instead of 
convenient instruments of a more general principle. 

The style is such, as to give a general impression of 
heaviness to the whole sermon. The doctor is never 
simple and natural for a single instant. Every thing 
smells of the rhetorician. He never appears to forget 
himself, or to be hurried by his subject into obvious 
language. Every expression seems to be the result of 
artifice and intention ; and as to the worthy dedicatees, 
the Lord Mayor and Aldermen, unless the sermon be 
done into English by a person of honour, they may 
perhaps be flattered by the Doctor's politeness, but 
they can never be much edified by his meaning. Dr. 
Parr seems to think, that eloquence consists not in 
exuberance of beautiful images — not in simple and 
sublime conceptions-— not in the feelings of the pas- 
sions ; but in a studious arrangement of sonorous, exo- 
tic, and sesquipedal words : a very ancient error, which 
corrupts the style of young, and wearies the patience 
of sensible men. In some of his combinations of words 
the Doctor is singularly unhappy. We have the din 
of superficial cavillers, the prancings of giddy ostenta- 
tion, fluttering vanity, hissing scorn, dank clod, &c. 
&c. &c. The following intrusion of a technical word 
into a pathetic description, renders the whole passage 
almost ludicrous. 

* Within a few days, mute was the tongue that uttered 
these celestial sounds, and the hand which signed your in 
denture lay cold and motionless in the dark and dreary 
chambers of death.' 

In page 16, Dr. Parr, in speaking of the indentures of 
the hospital, a subject (as we should have thought) 
little calculated for rhetorical panegyric, says of 
them — 

< If the writer of whom I am speaking had perused, as I 
have, your indentures, and your rules, he would have 
found in them seriousness without austerity, earnestness 
without extravagance, good sense without the trickeries of 
art, good language without the trappings of rhetoric, and 
the firmness of conscious worth, rather than the prancings 
of giddy ostentation.' 

The latter member of this eloge would not be wholly 
unintelligible, if applied to a spirited coach horse ; but 
we have never yet witnessed the phenomenon of a 
prancing indenture. 

It is not our intention to follow Dr. Parr through the 
copious and varied learning of his notes ; in the peru- 
sal of which we have been as much delighted with the 
richness of his acquisitions, the vigour of his under- 
standing, and the genuine goodness of his heart, as we 
have been amused with his ludicrous self-importance, 
and the miraculous simplicity of his character. We 
would rather recommend it to the Doctor to publish an 
annual list of worthies, as a kind of stimulus to lite- 
rary men ; to be included in which, will unquestiona- 
bly be considered as great an honour, as for a com- 
moner to be elevated to the peerage. A line of Greek, 
a line of Latin, or no line at all, subsequent to each 
name will distinguish, with sufficient accuracy, the 
shades of merit, and the degree of immortality con- 
ferred. 

Why should Dr. Parr confine this eulogomania to 
the literary characters of this island alone ? In the 
university of Benares, in the lettered kingdom of Ava, 
among the Mandarins at Pekin, there must, doubtless, 
be many men who have the eloquence of * Bappovo$ f 

JlavTSS jtlv crocpoi. eXd) Sc^SLxripov filv ce/So), Qavfiifa 
SI B&Spovov, Kal 0iX<3 TaiXwpov. See Lucian in Vita Da- 
monact. vol. ii. p. 894.— (Dr. Parr's note.) 



DR. PARR. 



Abe feeling of Tatiupos , and the j udgment of fi^poj, 
of whom Dr. Parr might he happy to say, that they 
have profundity without obscurity — perspicuity with- 
out prolixity — ornament without glare — terseness with- 
out barrenness — penetration without subtlety — com- 
prehensiveness without digression— and a great num- 
ber of other things without a great number of other 
things. 

In spite of 32 pages of very close printing, in de- 
fence of the University of Oxford, is it, or is it not 
true, that very many of its Professors enjoy ample 
salaries, without reading any lectures at all? The 
rharacter of particular colleges will certainly vary 
with the character of their governors ; but the Uni- 
versity of Oxford so far differs from Dr. Parr in the 
commendation bestowed upon its state of public edu- 
cation, that they have, since the publication of his 
book, we believe, and forty years after Mr. Gibbon's 
residence, completely abolished their very ludicrous 
and disgraceful exercises for degrees, and have sub- 
stituted in their place a system of exertion, and a 
scale of academical honours, calculated (we are wil- 
ing to hope) to produce the happiest effects. 

We were very sorry, in reading Dr. Parr's note on 
the Universities, to meet with the following pas- 
sage :— 

1 111 would it become me tamely and silently to acquiesce 
»n the strictures of this formidable accuser upon a seminary 
to which I owe so many obligations, though I left it, as 
must not be dissembled, before the usual time, and, in 
truth, had been almost compelled to leave it not by the 
want of proper education, for I had arrived at the first 
place in the first form of Harrow School, when I was not 
quite fourteen —not by the want of useful tutors, for mine 
were eminently able, and to me had been uniformly kind — 
not by the want of ambition, for I had begun to look up 
ardently and anxiously to academical distinctions — not by 
the want of attachment to the place, for I regarded it then, 
as I continue to regard it now, with the fondest and most 
unfeigned affection — but by another want, which it were 
unnecessary to name, and for the supply of which, after 
some hesitation, I determined to provide by patient toil and 
resolute self-denial, when I had not completed my twen- 
tieth year. I ceased, therefore, to reside, with an aching 
heart: I looked back with mingled feelings of regret and 
humiliation to advantages of which I could no longer par- 
take, and honours to which I could no longer aspire.' 

To those who know the truly honourable and re- 
spectable character of Dr. Parr, the vast extent of his 
learning, and the unadulterated benevolence of his 
nature, such an account cannot but be very affecting, 
in spite of the bad taste in which it is communicated. 
How painful to reflect, that a truly devout and atten- 
tive minister, a strenuous defender of the church 
establishment, and by far the most learned man of 
his day, should be permitted to languish on a little 
paltry curacy in Warwickshire ? 

Dii meliora, &c. &c* 



DR. RENNEL. (Edinburgh Review, 1802.) 

Discourses on Various Subjects. By Thomas Rennel, D. D. 
Master of the Temple. Rivington, London. 

We have no modern sermons in the English Ian. 
guage that can be considered as very eloquent. 
The merits of Blair (by far the most popular writer 
of sermons within the last century) are plain good 
sense, a happy application of scriptural quotation, 
and a clear harmonious style, richly tinged with scrip- 
tural language. He generally leaves his readers 
pleased with his judgment, and his observations on 
human conduct, without ever rising so high as to 
touch the great passions, or kindle any enthusiasm in 
favour of virtue. For eloquence, we must ascend as 
high as the days of Barrow and Jeremy Taylor : and 
even there, while we are delighted with their energy, 

* The courtly phrase was, that Dr. Parr was not a pro- 
ducible man. The same phrase was used for the neglect 
©ffaley, ^ 



their copiousness, and their fancy, we are in dangei 
of being suffocated by a redundance which abhors all 
discrimination , which compares till it perplexes, and 
illustrates till it confounds. 

To the Oases of Tillotson, Sherlock, and Atterbury, 
we must wade through a barren page, in which the 
weary Christian can descry nothing all around him 
but a dreary expanse of trite sentiments and languid 
words. 

The great object of modern sermons is to hazard 
nothing : their characteristic is, decent debility, 
which alike guards their authors from ludicrous 
errors, and precludes them from striking beauties. 
Every man of sense, in taking up an English sermon, 
expects to find it a tedious essay, full of common- 
place morality ; and if the fulfilment of such expecta- 
tions be meritorious, the clergy have certainly the 
merit of not disappointing their readers. Yet it is 
curious to consider, how a body of men so well edu- 
cated, and so magnificently endowed as the English 
clergy, should distinguish themselves so little in a 
species of composition to which it is their peculiar 
duty, as well as their ordinary habit, to attend. To 
solve this difficulty, it should be remembered, that 
the eloquence of the Bar and of the Senate force 
themselves into notice, power, and wealth — that the 
penalty which an individual client pays for choosing 
a bad advocate, is the loss of his cause — that a prime 
minister must infallibly suffer in the estimation of the 
public, who neglects to conciliate the eloquent men, 
and trusts the defence of his measures to those who 
have not adequate talents for that purpose : whereas, 
the only evil which accrues from the promotion of a 
clergyman to the pulpit, which he has no ability to 
fill as he ought, is the fatigue of the audience, and the 
discredit of that species of public instruction ; an evil 
so general, that no individual patron would think of 
sacrificing to it his particular interest. The clergy 
are generally appointed to their situations by those 
who have no interest that they should please the au- 
dience before whom they speak ; while the very re- 
verse is the case in the eloquence of the Bar, and of 
Parliament. We by no means would be understood 
to say, that the clergy should owe their promotion 
principally to their eloquence, or that eloquence ever 
could, consistently with the constitution of the Eng- 
lish Church, be made out a common cause of prefer- 
ment. In pointing out the total want of connection 
between the privilege of preaching, and the power of 
preaching well, we are giving no opinion as to whether 
it might or might not be remedied, but merely stat- 
ing a fact. Pulpit discourses have insensibly dwin- 
dled from speaking to reading; a practice, of itself, 
sufficient to stifle every germ of eloquence. It is only 
by the fresh feelings of the heart, that mankind can 
be very powerfully affected. What can be more lu- 
dicrous, than an orator delivering stale indignation, 
and fervour of a week old ; turning over whole pages 
of violent passions, written out in German text ; read- 
ing the tropes and apostrophes into which he is hur- 
ried by the ardour of his mind ; and so affected at a 
preconcerted line, and page, that he is unable to pro- 
ceed any farther ! 

The prejudices of the English nation have proceed- 
ed a good deal from their hatred to the French ; and 
because that country is the native soil of elegance, 
animation, and grace, a certain patriotic solidity, and 
loyal awkwardness, have become the characteristics 
of this ; so that an adventurous preacher is afraid of 
violating the ancient tranquillity of the pulpit $ and 
the audience are commonly apt to consider the mati 
who tires them less than usual, as a trifler, or a char- 
latan. 

Of British education, the study of eloquence makes 
little or no part. The exterior graces of a speaker 
are despised; and debating societies (admirable in- 
stitutions, under proper regulations) would hardly be 
tolerated either at Oxford or Cambridge. It is com- 
monly answered to any animadversions upon the elo- 
quence of the English pulpit, that a clergyman is to 
recommend himself, not by his eloquence, but by tho 
purity of his life, and the soundness of his doctrine ; 
an objection good enough : if any connection could be 



10 



WORKS OF THE REV. SIDNEY SMITH. 



pointed out between eloquence, heresy, and dissipa- 
tion : but, if it is possible for a man to live well, 
preach well, and teach well, at the same time, such 
objections, resting upon a supposed incompatibility 
of these good qualities, are duller than the dulness 
they defend. 

The clergy are apt to shelter themselves under the 
plea, that subjects so exhausted are utterly incapable 
of novelty ; and, in the very strictest sense of the 
word novelty, meaning that which was never said be- 
fore, at anytime, or in any place, this may be true 
enough, of the first principles of morals ; but the 
modes of expanding, illustrating, and enforcing a par- 
ticular theme are capable of infinite variety ; and, if 
they were not, this might be a good reason for preach- 
ing commonplace sermons, but is a very bad one for 
publishing them. 

We had great hopes, that Dr. Rennel's Sermons 
Would have proved an exception to the character we 
have given of seYmons in general ; and we have read 
through his present volume with a conviction rather 
that he has misapplied, than that he wants, talents for 
pulpit eloquence. The subjects of his sermons, four- 
teen in number, are, 1. The consequences of the vice 
of gaming: 2. On old age: 3. Benevolence exclusive- 
ly an evangelical virtue : 4. The services rendered to 
the English nation by the Church of England, a mo- 
tive for liberality to the orphan children of indigent 
ministers : 5. On the grounds and regulations of na- 
tional joy : 6. On the connection of the duties of love- 
ing the brotherhood, fearing God, and honouring the 
King: 7. On the guilt of blood-thirstiness: 8. On 
atonement: 9. A visitation sermon: 10. Great Brit- 
ain's naval strength, and insular situation, a cause of 
gratitude to Almighty God : 11. Ignorance productive 
of atheism, anarchy, and superstition: 12, 13, 14. On 
the sting of death, the strength of sin, and the victory 
over them both by Jesus Christ. 

Dr. Rennel's first sermon, upon the consequences of 
gaming, is admirable for its strength of language, its 
sound good sense, and the vigour with which it com- 
bats that detestable vice. From this sermon, we shall, 
with great pleasure, make an extract of some length. 

♦ Farther to this sordid habit the gamester joins a disposi- 
tion to fraud, and that of the meanest cast. To those who 
soberly and fairly appreciate the real nature of human ac- 
tions, nothing appears more inconsistent than that societies 
of men, who have incorporated themselves for the express 
purpose of gaming, should disclaim fraud or indirection, or 
affect to drive from their assemblies those among their asso- 
ciates whose crimes would reflect disgrace on them. Surely 
this, to a considerate mind, is as solemn and refined a ban- 
ter as can well be exhibited : for when we take into view 
the vast latitude allowed by the most upright gamesters, 
when we reflect that, according to their precious casuistry 
every advantage may be legitimately taken of the young, 
the unwary, and the inebriated, which superior coolness, 
skill, address, and activity can supply, we must look upon 
pretences to honesty as a most shameless aggravation of 
their crimes. Even if it were possible that, in his own prac- 
tices, a man might be a fair gamester, yet, for the result of 
the extended frauds committed by his fellows, he stands 
deeply accountable to God, his country, and his conscience. 
To a system necessarily implicated with fraud ; to associa- 
tions of men, a large majority of whom subsist by fraud ; 
to habits calculated to poison the source and principle of all 
integrity, he gives efficacy, countenance, and concurrence. 
Even his virtues he suffers to be subsidiary to the cause of 
vice. He sees with calmness, depredation committed daily 
and hourly in his company, perhaps under his very roof. 
Yet men of this description declaim (so desperately deceit- 
ful is the heart of man) against the very knaves they cher- 
ish and protect, and whom, perhaps, with some poor soph- 
istical refuge for a worn-out conscience, they even imitate. 
To such, let the Scripture speak with emphatical decision — 
When thou sawest a thief, then thou consentedst with him.' 

The reader will easily observe, in this quotation, a 
command of language, and a power of style, very su- 
perior to what is met with in the great mass of ser- 
mons. We shall make one more extract. 

« But in addition to fraud, and all its train of crimes, pro- 
pensities and habits of a very different complexion enter 
Into the composition of a gfcnester : a most ungovernable 
ferocity of DisposiTion, however for a time disguised and 
latent, is invariably the result of his system of conduct. 



Jealousy, rage, and revenge, exist among gamesters in their 
worst and most frantic excesses, and end frequently in con- 
sequences of the most atrocious violence and outrage. By 
perpetual agitation the malignant passions spurn and over- 
whelm every boundary which discretion and conscience 
can oppose. From what source are we to trace a very large 
number of those murders, sanctioned or palliated indeed by 
custom, but which stand at the tribunal of God precisely 
upon the same grounds with every other species of murder ? 
—From the gaming-table, from the nocturnal receptacles of 
distraction and frenzy, the duellist rushes with his hand 
lifted up against his brother's life ! — Those who are as yet 
on the threshold of these habits should be warned, that 
however calm their natural temperament, however meek 
and placable their disposition, yet that, by the events which 
every moment arise, they stand exposed to the ungoverna- 
ble fury of themselves and others. In the midst of fraud, 
protected by menace on the one hand, and on the otheT, of 
despair ; irritated by a recollection of the meanness of the 
artifices and the baseness of the hands by which utter and 
remediless ruin has been inflicted ; in the midst of these 
feelings of horror and distraction it is, that the voice of 
brethren's blood "crieth unto God from the ground" — " and 
now art thou cursed from the earth, which hath opened her 
mouth to receive thy brother's blood from thy hand." Not 
only THOU who actually sheddest that blood, but thou 
who art the artificer of death— thou who administerest in 
centives to these habits — who disseminatest the practice of 
them — improvest the skill in them — sharpenest the propen- 
sity to them — at thy hands will it be required, surely, at 
the tribunal of God in the next world, and perhaps, in most 
instances, in his distributive and awful dispensations to- 
wards thee and thine here on earth.' 

Having paid this tribute of praise to Dr. Rennel's 
first sermon, we are sorry so soon to change our eulo- 
gium into censure, and to blame him for having select- 
ed for publication so many sermons touching directly 
and indirectly upon the French Revolution. We con- 
fess ourselves long since wearied with this kind of dis- 
courses, bespattered with blood and brains, and ring- 
ing eternal changes upon atheism, cannibalism, and 
apostasy. Upon the enormities of the French Revo- 
lution there can be but one opinion ; but the subject is 
not fit for the pulpit. The public are disgusted with 
it to saiety ; and we can never help remembering, that 
this politico-orthodox rage in the mouth of a preacher 
may be profitable as well as sincere. Upon such sub- 
jects as the murder of the Queen of France, and the 
great events of these days, it is not possible to endure 
the draggling and the daubing of such a ponderous 
limner as Dr. Rennel, after the etherial touches of Mr. 
Burke. In events so truly horrid in themselves, the 
field is so easy for a declaimer, that we set little value 
upon the declamation ; and the mind, on such occa- 
sions, so easily outruns ordinary description, that we 
are apt to feel more, before a mediocre oration begins, 
than it even aims at inspiring. 

We are surprised that Dr. Rennel, from among the 
great number of subjects which he must have dis- 
cussed in the pulpit (the interest in which must be 
permanent and universal) should have published such 
an empty and frivolous sermon as that upon the victo- 
ry of Lord Nelson ; a sermon good enough for the gar- 
rulity of joy, when the phrases, and the exultation of 
the Porcupine, or the True Briton, may pass for elo- 
quence or sense ; but utterly unworthy of the works of 
a man who aims at a place among the great teachers 
of morality and religion. 

Dr. Rennel is apt to put on the appearance of a holy 
bully, an evangelical swaggerer, as if he could carry 
his point against infidelity by big words and strong 
abuse, and kick and cuff men into Christians. It is a 
very easy thing to talk about the shallow impost* 
ures, and the silly ignorant sophisms of Voltaire, Rous 
seau, Condorcet, D'Alembert, and Volney, and to say 
that Hume is not worth answering. This affectation 
of contempt will not do. While these pernicious wri- 
ters have power to allure from the Church great num- 
bers of proselytes, it is better to study them diligent- 
ly, and to reply to them satisfactorily, than to veil in-l 
solence, want of power, or want of industry, by a pre- 
tended contempt ; which may leave infidels and wa- 
vering Christians to suppose that such writers are 
abused, because they are feared ; and not answered, 
because they are unanswerable. While every body 
was abusing and desoising Mr. Godwin, and while Mr.{ 



DR. PARR. 



11 



Godwin was, among a certain description of under- 1 This passage, at first, struck u&r.o be untrue ; and 
standings, increasing every day in popularity, Mr. Mai- we could not immediately recollect the afflictions Dr. 
thus* took the trouble of refuting him ; and we hear I Rennel alluded to, till it occurred to us, that he must 
no more Of Mr. Godwin. We recommend this exam- 
ple to the consideration of Dr. Rennel, who seems to 
think it more useful and pleasant, to rail than to fight. 
After the world has returned to its sober senses upon 
the merits of the ancient philosophy, it is amusing 
enough to see a few bad heads bawling for the restora- 
tion of exploded errors and past infatuation. We have 
some dozen of plethoric phrases about Aristotle, who 
is, in the estimation of the Doctor, et rex et sutor bo 
nus, and every thing else ; and to the neglect of whose 
works he seems to attribute every moral and physical 
evil under which the world has groaned for the last 
century. Dr. Rennel's admiration of the ancients is 
so great, that he considers the works of Homer to be 
the region and depository of natural law and natural 
religion.f Now, if, by natural religion, is meant the 
will of God collected from his works, and the necessi- 
ty man is under of obeying it, it is rather extraordi- 
nary that Homer should be so good a natural theolo- 
gian, when the divinities he has painted are certainly 
a more drunken, quarrelsome, adulterous, intriguing, 
lascivious set of beings, than are to be met with in the 
most profligate court in Europe. There is, every now 
and then, some plain coarse morality in Homer ; but 
the most bloody revenge, and the most savage cruelty 
in warfare, the ravishing of women, and the sale of 
men, &c. &c. &c. are circumstances which the old 
bard seems to relate as the ordinary events of his 
times, without ever dreaming that there could be much 
harm in them ; and if it be urged that Homer took his 
ideas of right and wrong from a barbarous age, that is 
just saying, in other words, that Homer had very im- 
perfect ideas of natural law. 

Having exhausted all his powers of eulogium upon 
the times that are gone, Dr. Rennel indemifies himself 
by the very novel practice of declaiming against the 
present age. It is an evil age — an adulterous age — an 
ignorant age — an apostate age — and a foppish age. Of 
the propriety of the last epithet, our readers may per- 
haps be more convinced, by calling to mind a class of 
fops not unusually designated by that epithet — men 
clothed in profound black, with large canes, and 
Strange amorphous hats — of big speech, and impera- 
tive presence — talkers about Plato — great affecters of 
senility — despisers of women, and all the graces of 
life — fierce foes to common sense — abusive of the 
living, and approving no one who has not been dead 
for at least a century. Such fops, as vain, and as shal- 
lowas their fraternity in Bond Street, differ from these 
only as Gorgonius differed from Rufillus. 

In the ninth Discourse (p. 226,) we read of St. Paul, 
that he had ' an heroic zeal, directed, rather than 
bounded, by the nicest and most profound humility.' 
This is intended for a fine piece of writing ; but it is 
without meaning : for, if words have any limits, it is 
a contradiction in terms to say of the same person, at 
the same time, that he is nicely discreet, and heroi- 
cally zealous ; or that he is profoundly humble, and 
imperatively dignified : and if Dr. Rennel means, that 
St. Paul displayed these qualities at different times, 
then could not any one of them direct or soften the 
other. 

Sermons are so seldom examined with any consi- 
derable degree of critical vigilance, that we are apt to 
discover in them sometimes a great laxity of asser- 
tion : such as the following : — 



must 

undoubtedly mean the eight hundred and fifty actions 
which, in the course of eighteen months, have been 
brought against the clergy for non-residence. 

Upon the danger to be apprehended from Roman 
Catholics in this country, Dr. Rennel is laughable. 
We should as<«oon dream that the wars of York and 
Lancaster would break out afresh, as that the Pro- 
testant religion in England has any thing to apprehend 
from the machinations of Catholics. To such a- scheme 
as that of Catholic emancipation, which has for its 
object to restore their natural rights to three or four 
millions of men, and to allay the fury of religious 
hatred, Dr. Rennel is, as might be expected, a very 
strenuous antagonist. Time, which lifts up the veil 
of political mystery, will inform us if the Doctor has 
taken that side of the question which may be as lucra- 
tive to himself as it is. inimical to human happiness, 
and repugnant to enlightened policy. 

Of Dr. Rennel's talents as a reasoner, we certainly 
have formed no very high opinion. Unless dogmati- 
cal assertion, and the practice (but too common among 
theological writers) of taking the thing to be proved, 
for part of the proof, can be considered as evidence of a 
logical understanding, the specimens of argument Dr. 
Rennel has afforded us are very insignificant. For 
putting obvious truths into vehement language ; for 
expanding and adorning moral instruction ; this gen- 
tleman certainly possesses considerable talents : and 
if he will moderate his insolence, steer clear of theo- 
logical metaphysics, and consider rather those great 
laws of Christian practice, which must interest man- 
kind through all ages, than the petty questions which 
are important to the Chancellor of the Exchequer for 
the time being, he may live beyond his own days, and 
become a star of the third or fourth magnitude in the 
English Church. 



_ 'Labour to be undergone, afflictions to be borne, contra- 
dictions to be endured, danger to be braved, interest to be 
despised in the best and most flourishing ages of the church, 
are the perpetual badges of far the greater part of those who 
take up their cross and follow Christ.' 



* I cannot read the name of Malthua without adding my 
tribute of affection for the memory of one of the best men 
thai ever lived. He loved philosophical truth more than any 
man I ever knew,— was full of practical wisdom,— and 



JOHN BOWLES. (Edinburgh Review, 1802.; 

Reflections at the conclusion of the War: Being a sequel to 
Reflections on the Political and Moral State of Society at 
the Close of the Eighteenth Century. The Third Edi- 
tion; with Additions. By John Bowles, Esq. 



If this piece be, as Mr. Bowles asserts,* the death- 
warrant of the liberty and power of Great Britain, we 
will venture to assert, that it is also the death-warrant 
of Mr. Bowles's literary reputation ; and that the 
people of this island, if they verify his predictions, 
and cease to read his books, whatever they may lose 
in political greatness, will evince no small improve- 
ment in critical acumen. There is a political, as well 
as a bodily hypochondriasis ; and there are empirics 
always on the watch to make their prey, either of the 
one or of the other. Dr. Solomon, Dr. Brodum, and 
Mr. Bowles, have all commanded their share of the 
public attention : but the two former gentlemen con- 
tinue to flourish with undiminished splendour ; while 
the patients of the latter are fast dwindling away, and 
his drugs falling into disuse and contempt. 

The truth is, if Mr. Bowles had begun his literary 
career at a period when superior discrimination, and 
profound thought, not vulgar violence, and the eternal 
repetition of rabble-rousing words, were necessary to 
literary reputation, he would never have emerged 
from that obscurity to which he will soon return. 
The intemperate passions of the public, not his own 
talents, have given him some temporary reputation ; 
and now, when men hope and fear with less eagerness 
than they have been lately accustomed to do, Mr. 
Bowles will be compelled to descend from that mo- 
derate eminence, where no man of real genius would 
ever have condescended to remain. 

The pamphlet is written in the genuine spirit of the 

* It is impossible to conceive the mischievous power of 
ISTta ^SS? 1 £ contem P tuous feeun SS aga^ his mfen- the corrupt alarmists of those days, and the despotic man- 
•ib in understanding. ner in which they exercised their authority. They were 

t rage di8. fair objects for the Edinburgh Review. 



12 



WORKS OF THE REV. SIDNEY SMITH. 



Windham and Burke School ; though Mr. Bowles can- 
not he called a servile copyist of either of these gen- 
tlemen, as he has rejected the logic of the one, and 
the eloquence of the other, and imitated them only in 
their headstrong violence, and exaggerated abuse. 
There are some men who continue to astonish and 

? lease the world, even in the support of a bad cause, 
'hey are mighty in their fallacies, and beautiful in 
their errors. Mr. Bowles sees only one half of the 

Erecedent ; and thinks, in order to be famous, that he 
as nothing to do but to be in the wrong. 
War, eternal war, till the wrongs of Europe are 
avenged, and the Bourbons restored, is the master- 
principle of Mr. Bowles's political opinions, and the 
object for which he declaims through the whole of 
the present pamphlet. 

The first apprehensions which Mr. Bowles seems to 
entertain, are of the boundless ambition and perfidious 
character of the First Consul, and of that military 
despotism he has established, which is not only im- 
pelled by the love of conquest, but interested, for its 
own preservation, to desire the overthrow of other 
states. Yet the author informs us, immediately after, 
that the life of Buonaparte is exposed to more dangers 
than that of any other individual in Europe who is 
not actually in the last stage of an incurable disease ; 
and that his death, whenever it happens, must involve 
the dissolution of that machine of government, of 
which he must be considered not only as the sole di- 
rector, but the main spring. Confusion of thought, 
we are told, is one of the truest indications of terror ; 
and the panic of this alarmist is so very great, that 
he cannot listen to the consolation which he himself 
affords : for it appears, upon summing up these perils, 
that we are in the utmost danger of being destroyed 
by a despot, whose system of government, as dread- 
ful as himself, cannot survive him, and who, in all 
human probability, will be shot or hanged, before he 
can execute any one of his projects against us. 

We have a good deal of flourishing in the beginning 
of the pamphlet, about the effect of the moral sense 
upon the stability of governments ; that is, as Mr. 
Bowles explains it, the power which all old govern- 
ments derive from the opinion entertained by the 
people of the justice of their rights. If this sense of 
ancient right be (as is here confidently asserted) 
strong enough ultimately to restore the Bourbons, 
why are we to fight for that which will be done with- 
out any fighting at all ? And, if it be strong enough 
to restore, why was it weak enough to render restora- 
tion necessary? 

To notice every singular train of reasoning into 
which Mr. Bowles falls, is not possible and in the 
copious choice of evils, we shall, from feelings of 
mercy, take the least. 

It must not be forgotten, he observes, < that those 
rights of government, which, because they are ancient, 
are recognized by the moral sense as lawful, are the 
only ones which are compatible with civil liberty.' 
So that all questions of right and wrong, between the 
governors and the governed, are determinable by 
chronology alone . Every political institution is favour- 
able to liberty, not according to its spirit, but in pro- 
portion to the antiquity of its date ; and the slaves of 
Great Britain are groaning under the trial by jury, 
while the freemen of Asia exult in the bold privilege 
transmitted to them by their fathers, of being tram- 
pled to death by elephants. 

In the eighth page, Mr. Bowles thinks that France, 
if she remains without a king, will conquer all Europe ; 
and, in the nineteenth page, all the miseries of France 
are stated to be a judgment of heaven for their cruelty 
to their king : and in the 33d page, they are disco- 
vered to proceed from the perfidy of the same king 
to this country in the American contest. So that cer- 
tain misfortunes proceed from the maltreatment of a 
person, who had himself occasioned these identical 
misfortunes before he was maltreated; and while 
Providence is compelling the French, by every species 
of affliction, to resume monarchical government, they 
are to acquire such extraordinary vigour, from not 
acting as Providence would wish, that they are to 



trample on every nation which co-operates with the< 

Divine intention. 

In the 60th page, Mr. Bowles explains what is* 
meant by Jacobinism ; and, as a concluding proof oi 
the justice with which the character is drawn, tri-' 
umphantly quotes the case of a certain R. Mountain,! 
who was tried for damning all kings and all govern-' 
ments upon earth; for, adds R. Mountain, 'I am a 
Jacobin.' No one can more thoroughly detest and' 
despise that restless spirit of political innovation, 
which, we suppose, is meant by the name of Jaco- 
binism, than we ourselves do ; but we were highly 
amused with this proof, ab ebriis sutoribus, of the 
prostration of Europe, the last hour of human felicity,- 
the perdition of man, discovered in the crapulous eruc- 
tations of a drunken cobler. 

This species of evidence might certainly have es- 
caped a common observer : but this is not all ; there* 
are other proofs of treason and sedition, equally 
remote, sagacious and profound. Many good subjects 
are not very much pleased with the idea of the Whig: 
Club dining together ; but Mr. Bowles has the merit of 
first calling the public attention to the alarming prac- 
tice of singing after dinner at these political meetings.; 
He speaks with a proper horror of tavern dinners, 

'—where conviviality is made a stimulus to disaffection— 
where wine serves only to inflame disloyalty — where toast-f- 
are converted into a vehicle of sedition — and where the 
powers of harmony are called forth in the cause of Discord 
by those hireling singers, who are equally ready to invoke 
the Divine favour on the head of their King, or to strain 
their venal throats in chanting the triumphs of his bitter- 
est enemies.' 

All complaint is futile, which is not followed up] 
with appopriate remedies. If Parliament, or Catarrh, 
do not save us, Dignum and Sedgwick will quaver away 
the King, shake down the House of Lords, and warble 
us into all the horrors of republican government; 
When, in addition to these dangers, we reflect also 
upon those with which our national happiness is me- 
naced, by the present thinness of ladies' petticoats 
(p. 78), temerity may hope our salvation, but how can 
reason promise it ? 

One solitary gleam of comfort, indeed beams upon 
us in reading the solemn devotion of this modern Cur- 
tius to the cause of his King and country — 

'My attachment to the British monarchy, and to the 
reigning family, is rooted in my "heart's core."— My anxi- 
ety for the British throne, pending the dangers to which, in 
common with every other throne, it has lately been ex- 
posed, has embittered my choicest comforts. And I must 
solemnly vow, before Almighty God, to devote myself, to 
the end of my days, to the maintenance of that throne.' 

Whether this patriotism be original, or whether it be> 
copied from the Upholsterer in Foote's Farces, who sits 
up whole nights watching over the British constitution, 
we shall not stop to inquire ; when the practical effect 
of sentiments is good, we would not diminish their 
merits by investigating their origin. We seriously 
commend in Mr. Bowles this future dedication of his 
life to the service of his King and country; and 
consider it as a virtual promise that he will write no 
more in their defence. No wise or good man has ever; 
thought of either, but with admiration and respect. 
That they should be exposed to that ridicule, by the. 
forward imbecility of friendship, from which theyv 
appear to be protected by intrinsic worth, is so painful 
a consideration, that the very thought of it. we are 
persuaded, will induce Mr. Bowles to desist from 
writing on political subjects. 



DR. LANGFORD. (Edinburgh Review, 1802.) 

Anniversary Sermon of the Royal Humane Society. By W. 
Langford, D. D. Printedfor F. and C. Rivfngton. 

An accident, which happened to the gentleman en. 
gaged in reviewing this sermon proves, in the most 
striking manner, the importance of this charity forr 
restoring to life persons in. whom the vital power it » 



ARCHDEACON NARES. 



IS 



suspended. He was discovered, with Dr. Langford's* 
discourse lying open before him, in a state of the most 
profound sleep, from which he could not, by any 
means, be awakened for a great great length of time. 
By attending, however, to the rules prescribed by the 
Humane Society, flinging in the smoke of tobacco, 
applying hot flannels, and carefully removing the dis- 
course itself to a great distance, the critic was restored 
to his disconsolate brothers. 

The only account he could give of himself was, that 
he remembers reading on, regularly, till he came to 
the following pathetic description of a drowned trades- 
man, beyond which he recollects nothing. 

« But to the individual himself, as a man, let us add the 
interruption to all the temporal business in which his inte- 
rest was engaged. To him indeed now apparently lost, the 
world is as nothing ; but it seldom happens, that man can 
live for himself "alone: society parcels out its concerns in 
Various connections; and from one head issue waters 
which run down in many channels. The spring being sud- 
denly cut off, what confusion must follow in the streams 
which have flowed from its source? It maybe, that all 
the expectations reasonably raised of approaching prosperi- 
ty, to those who have embarked in the same occupation, 
may at once disappear; and the important interchange of 
commercial faith be broken off, before it could be brought 
to any advantageous conclusion.' 

This extract will suffice for the style of the sermon. 
The charity itself is above all praise. 



ARCHDEACON NARES.* (Edinburgh Review, 
1802.) 

A Thanksgiving for Plenty, and Warning against Avarice. 
A Sermon. By the Reverend Robert Nares, Archdeacon 
of Stafford, and Canon Residentiary of Litchfield. Lon- 
don: Printed for the Author, and sold by Rivingtons, 
St. Paul's Churchyard. 

For the swarm of ephemeral sermons which issue 
from the press, we are principally indebted to the vani- 
ty of popular preachers, who are puffed up by female 
praises into a belief, that what may be delivered, with 
great propriety, in a chapel full of visitors and friends, 
is fit for the deliberate attention of the public, who 
cannot be influenced by the decency of a clergyman's 
private life, flattered by the sedulous politeness of his 
manners, or misled by the fallacious circumstances of 
voice and action. A clergyman cannot be always con- 
sidered as reprehensible for preaching an indifferent 
sermon ; because, to the active piety, and correct life, 
which the profession requires, many an excellent man 
may not unite talents for that species of composition ; 
but every man who prints, imagines he gives to the 
world something which they had not before, either in 
matter or style ; that he has brought forth new truths, 
or adorned old ones ; and when, in lieu of novelty and 
ornament, we can discover nothing but trite imbecility, 
the law must take its course, and the delinquent suffer 
that mortification from which vanity can rarely be ex- 
pected to escape, when it chooses dulness for the mini- 
ster of its gratifications. 

The learned author, after observing that a large 
army praying would be a much finer spectacle than a 
large army fighting, and after entertaining us with the 
old anecdote of Xerxes, and the flood of tears, proceeds 
to express his sentiments on the late scarcity, and the 
present abundance : then, stating the manner in which 
the Jews were governed by the immediate interference 
of God, and informing us, that other people expect not, 
nor are taught to look for, miraculous interference, to 
mulish or reward them, he proceeds to talk of the visi- 
tation of Providence, for the purposes of trial, warn- 
ing, and correction, as if it were a truth of which he 
had never doubted 

Still, however, he contends, though the Deity does 

• To this exceedingly foolish man, the first years of 
Etonian Education were intrusted. How is it possible to 
Inflict a greater misfortune on a country, than to fill up 
Men an office with such an officer? 

f This was another gentleman of the alarmist tribe. . 



interfere, it would be presumptuous and impious to 
pronounce the purposes for which he interferes ; and 
then adds, that it has pleased God, within these few 
years, to give us a most awful lesson of the vanity of 
agriculture and importation without piety, and that he 
has proved this to the conviction of every thinking 
mind. 

1 Though he interpose not (says Mr. Nares) by posi- 
tive miracle, he influences by means unknown to all 
but himself, and directs the winds, the rain, and the 
glorious beams of heaven to execute his judgment, ot 
fulfil his merciful designs.' — Now, either the wind, the 
ram, and the beams, are here represented to act as 
they do in the ordinary course of nature, or they are 
not. If they are, how can their operations be consid- 
ered as a judgment on sins ? and if they are not, what 
are their extraordinary operations, but positive mira- 
cles ? So that the Archdeacon, after denying that any 
body knows when, how, and why the Creator works a 
miracle, proceeds to specify the time, instrument, and 
object of a miraculous scarcity ; and then, assuring us 
that the elements were employed to execute the judg- 
ments of Providence, denies that this is any proof of a 
positive miracle. 

Having given us this specimen of his talents for 
theological metaphysics, Mr. Nares commences his 
attack upon the farmers ; accuses them of cruelty and 
avarice; raises the old cry of monoply; and expresses 
some doubts, in a note, whether the better way would 
not be, to subject their granaries to the control of an 
exciseman ; and to levy heavy penalties upon those, 
in whose possession corn, beyond a certain quantity to 
be fixed by law, should be found. — This style of rea- 
soning is pardonable enough in those who argue from 
the belly rather than the brains ; but in a well fed, and 
well educated clergyman, who has never been disturb- 
ed by hunger from the free exercise of cultivated 
talents, it merits the severest reprehension. The far- 
mer has it not in his power to raise the price of corn ; 
he never has fixed and never can fix it. He is unques- 
tionably justified in receiving any price he can obtain : 
for it happens very beautifully, that the effect of his 
efforts to better his fortune, is as beneficial to the pub- 
lic, as if their motive had not been selfish. The poor are 
not to be supported, in time of famine, by abatement 
of price on the part of the farmer, but by the subscrip- 
tion of residentiary canons, archdeacons, and all men 
rich in public or private property ; and to these sub- 
scriptions the farmer should contribute according to 
the amount of his fortune. To insist that he should 
take a less price when he can obtain a greater, is to 
insist upon laying on that order of men the whole bur- 
den of supporting the poor ; a convenient system 
enough in the eyes of a rich ecclesiastic ; and objec 
tionable only, because it is impracticable, pernicious, 
and unjust.* 

The question of the com trade has divided society 
into two parts — those who have any talents for reason, 
ing, and those who have not. We owe an apology to 
our readers, for taking any notice of errors that have 
been so frequently, and so unanswerably exposed ; but 
when they are echoed from the bench and the pulpit, 
the dignity of the teacher may perhaps communicate 
some degree of importance to the silliest and most 
extravagant doctrines. t 

No reasoning can be more radically erroneous than 
that upon which the whole of Mr. Nares's sermon is 
founded. The most benevolent, the most Christian, 
and the most profitable conduct the farmer can pur- 
sue, is, to sell his commodities for the highest price 
he can possibly obtain. This advice, we think, is 
not in any great danger of being rejected : we wish 
we were equally sure of success in counselling the 
Reverend Mr. Nares to attend, in future, to practical, 
rather than theoretical questions about provisions. 



* If it is pleasant to notice the intellectual growth of an 
individual, it is still more pleasant to see the public grow- 
ing wiser. This absurdity of attributing the high price of 
corn to the combinations of farmers, was the common non- 
sense talked in the days of my youth. I remember when 
ten judges out of twelve laid down this doctrine in their 
charges to the various grand juries on the circuits, Th » 
lowest attorney J $lerk is now better instructed. 



14 



WORKS OF THE REV. SIDNEY SMITH. 



He may bo a very hospitable archdeacon ; but noth- 
ing short of a positive miracle can make him an acute 
reasoner. , 



MATTHEW LEWIS. (Edinburgh Review, 1803.) 

Alfonso King of Castile. A Tragedy, in five Acts. By M. 
G. Lewis. Price 2s. 6d. 

Alfonso, king of Castile, had, many years previ- 
ous to the supposed epoch of the play, left his mini- 
ster and general, Orsino, to perish in prison, from a 
false accusation of treason. Caesario, son to Orsino, 
(who by accident had liberated Amelrosa, daughter 
of Alfonso, from the Moors, and who is married to 
her, unknown to the father,) becomes a great favour- 
ite with the King, and avails himself of the command 
of the armies with which he is intrusted, to gratify 
his revenge for his father's misfortunes, to forward 
his own ambitious views, and to lay a plot by which 
he may deprive Alfonso of his throne and his life. 
Marquis Guzman, poisoned by his wife Ottilia in love 
with Caesario, confesses to the King that the papers 
upon which the suspicion of Orsino's guilt was found- 
ed, were forged by him : and the King, learning from 
his daughter Amelrosa that Orsino is still alive, re- 
pairs to his retreat in the forest, is received with the 
most implacable hauteur and resentment, and in vain 
implores forgiveness of his injured minister. To the 
same forest, Caesario, informed of the existence of his 
father, repairs, and reveals his intended plot against 
the King. Orsino, convinced of Alfonso's goodness 
to his subjects, though incapable of forgiving him for 
his unintentional injuries to himself, in vain dissuades 
his son from the conspiracy ; and at last, ignorant of 
their marriage, acquaints Amelrosa with the plot 
formed by her husband against her father. Amel- 
rosa, already poisoned by Ottilia, in vain, attempts to 
prevent Caesario from blowing uo a mine laid under 
the royal palace ; information of which sbe had re- 
ceived from Ottilia, stabbed by Caesario to avoid her 
importunity. In the mean time, the King ha J been 
removed from the palace by Orsino, to his ancient 
retreat in the forest : the people rise against the 
usurper Caesario ; a battle takes place : Orsino stabs 
his own son, at the moment the King is in his son's 
power ; falls down from the wounds he has received 
m battle ; and dies in the usual dramatic style, re- 
peating twenty-two hexameter verses. Mr. Lewis 
says in his preface — 

« To the assertion, that my play is stupid, I have nothing 
to object ; if it he found so, even let it be so said ; but if 
(as was most falsely asserted of Adelmorn) any anonymous 
writer should advance that this Tragedy is immoral, I ex- 
pect him to prove his assertion l>y quoting the objectionable 
passages. This I demand as an act of justice.' 



We confess ourselves to have been highly delighted 
with these symptoms of returning, or perhaps nascent 
purity in the mind of Mr. Lewis — a delight somewhat 
impaired, to be sure, at the opening of the play, by the 
following explanation which Ottilia gives of her early 
rising. 

* ACT I. Scene I. — The palace garden. — Day-break. 
Ottilia enters in a night-dress : her hair flows dishevelled. 
Ottil. Dews of the morn descend! Breathe, summer 
gales : 
My Hushed cheeks woo ye ! Play, sweet wantons, play 
'Mid my loose tresses, fan my panting breast, 
Quench my blood's burning fever ! — Vain, vain prayer ! 
Not Winter throned 'midst Alpine snows, whose will 
Can with one breath, one touch, congeal whole realms, 
And blanch whole seas : not that fiend's self could ease 
This heart, this gulf of flames, his purple kingdom, 
Where passion rules and rages!' 

Ottilia at last becomes quite furious, from the convic- 
t ioa that Caesario has been sleeping with a second lady, 
called Estella ; whereas be has really been sleeping 
with a third lady, called Amelrosa. Passing across the 
stage ; this gallant gentleman takes an opportunity of 
mentioning to the audience that he has been passing 
his time very agreeably, meets Cttilia, quarrels, makes 
it up ; and so end the first two or three scenes. 



Mr. Lewis will excuse us for the liberty we tak* fat 
commenting on a few passages in his play which ap. 
pear to us rather exceptionable. The only information 
which Caesario, imagining his father to have been dead 
for many years, receives of his existence, is in the fol- 
lowing short speech of Melchior. 

1 Milch. The Count San Lucar, long thought dead, buts* 
ved, 
It seems, by Ainelrosa's care. — Time presses — 
I must away : farewell.' 

To this laconic, but important information, Caesario 
makes no reply, but merely desires Melchior to meet 
him at one o'clock, under the Royal Tower, and for 
some other purposes. 

In the few cases which have fallen under our obser- 
vation, of fathers restored to life after a supposed death 
of twenty years, the parties concerned have, on the 
first information, appeared a little surprised, and gene- 
rally asked a few questions — though we do not go the 
length of saying it is natural to do so. This same Cat - 
sario, (whose love of his father is a principal cause f 
his conspiracy against the King) begins criticising- the 
old warrior, upon his first seeing him again, much as a 
virtuoso would criticise an old statue that wanted an 
arm or a leg. 

' Orsino enters from the cave. 
CjEsario. Now by my life 

A noble ruin !' 
Amelrosa, who imagines her father to have banished 
her from his presence for ever, in the first transports of 
pardon, obtained by earnest intercessions, thus ex- 
claims : — 

' Lend thy doves, dear Venus, 
That I may send them where Caesario strays-: 
And while he smooths their silver wings, and gives them 
For drink the honey of his lips, I'll bid them 
Coo in his ear, his Amelrosa's happy !' 

What judge of human feelings does not recognize in 
these images of silver wings, doves and honey, the ge- 
nuine language of the passions ? 

If Mr. Lewis is really in earnest in pointing out the 
coincidence between his own dramatic sentiments and 
the Gospel of St. Matthew, such a reference (wide as 
we know this assertion to be) evinces a want of judg- 
ment of which we did not think him capable . If it pro. 
ceeded from irreligious levity, we pity the man who 
has bad taste enough not to prefer honest dulness to 
such paltry celebrity. 

We beg leave to submit to Mr. Lewis, if Alfonso, 
considering the great interest he has in the decision, 
might not interfere a little in the long argument carried 
on between Caesario and Orsino, upon the propriety of 
putting him to death. To have expressed any decisive 
opinion upon the subject, might perhaps have been 
incorrect ; but a few gentle hints as to that side of the 
question to which he leaned, might be fairly allowed to 
be no very unnatural incident. 

This tragedy delights in explosions. Alfonso's em- 
pire is destroyed by a blast of gunpowder, and re- 
stored by a clap of thunder. After the death of Cae- 
sario, and a short exhortation to that purpose by 
Orsino, all the conspirators fall down in a thunder- 
clap, ask pardon of the king, and are forgiven. This 
mixture of physical and moral power is beautiful ! 
How interesting a water-spout would appear among 
Mr. Lewis's kings and queens ! We anxiously look 
forward, in his next tragedy, to a fall of snow three or 
four feet deep ; or expect that a plot shall gradually 
unfold itself by means of a general thaw. 

All is not so bad in this play. There is some strong 
painting, which shows, every now and then, the hand 
of a master. The agitation which Caesario exhibits 
upon his first joining the conspirators in a cave, pre- 
vious to the blowing up of the mine, and immediately 
after stabbing Ottilia, is very fine. 

' C/esario. ' Ay, shout, shout, 

And kneeling greet your blood-annointed king, 
This steel his sceptre ! Tremble, dwarfs in guilt, 
And own your master! Thou art proof, Henriquez, 
'Gainst pity ; I once »aw thee stab in battle 
A pa«e who clasped thy knees: And Melchoir there 
Made quick work with a brother whom he hated. 
But what did I this night ? Hear, hear, and reverence' 



AUSTRALIA. 



lb 



There -was a breast on which my head had rested 
A thousand times ; a breast which loved me fondly 
As heaven loves martyred saints : and yet this breast 
I stabbed, knave — stabbed it to the heart— Wine! 

wine there ? 
For my soul's joyous !' — p. 86. 

The resistance which Amelrosa opposes to the firing 
of the mine, is well wrought out ; and there is some 
good poetry scattered up and down the play, of which 
we should very willingly make extracts if our limits 
would permit. The ill success which it has justly 
experienced, is owing, we have no doubt, to the want 
of nature in the characters, and of probability and 
good arrangement in the incidents ; objections of some 
force. 



AUSTRALIA. (Edinburgh Review, 1803.) 

Account of the English Colony of New South Wales. By 
Lieutenant-Colonel Collins of the Royal Marines. Vol. 
II. 4to. Cadell and Davies, London. 

To introduce an European population, and, conse- 
quently, the arts and civilization of Europe, into such 
an untrodden country as New Holland, is to confer a 
lasting and important benefit upon the world. If man 
be destined for perpetual activity, and if the proper 
objects of that activity be the subjugation of physical 
difficulties, and of his own dangerous passions, how 
absurd are those systems which proscribe the acquisi- 
tions of science and the restraints of law, and would 
arrest the progress of man in the rudest and earliest 
stages of his existence ! Indeed, opinions so very 
extravagant in their nature must be attributed rather 
to the wantonness of paradox, than to sober reflection 
and extended inquiry. 

To suppose the savage state permanent, we must 
suppose the numbers of those who compose it to be 
stationary, and the various passions by which men 
have actually emerged from it to be extinct ; and this 
is to suppose man a very different being from what he 
really is. To prove such a permanence beneficial, (if 
it were possible), we must have recourse to matter of 
fact, and judge of the rude state of society, not from 
the praises ot tranquil literati, but from the narratives 
of those who have seen it through a nearer and better 
medium than that of imagination. There is an argu- 
ment, however, for the continuation of evil, drawn 
from the ignorance of good ; by which it is contended, 
that to teach men their situation can be better, is to 
teach them that it is bad, and to destroy that happi- 
ness which always results from an ignorance that any 
greater happiness is within our reach. All pains and 
pleasures are clearly by comparison ; but the most de- 

£lorable savage enjoys a sufficient contrast of good, to 
now that the grosser evils from which civilization 
rescues him are evils. A New Hollander seldom pas- 
ses a year without suffering from famine ; the small- 
pox falls upon him like a plague ; he dreads those 
calamities, though he does not know how to avert 
them; but, doubtless, would find his happiness in- 
creased, it they were averted. To deny this, is to sup- 
pose that men are reconciled to evils because they are 
inevitable ; and yet hurricanes, earthquakes, bodily 
decay, and death, stand highest in the catalogue of 
human calamities. 

Where civilization gives new birth to new compari- 
sons unfavourable to savage life, with the information 
that a greater good is possible, it generally connects 
the means of attaining it. The savage no sooner be- 
comes ashamed of his nakedness than the loom is 
ready to clothe him ; the forge prepares for him more 
perfect tools, when he is disgusted with the awkward- 
ness of his own; his weakness is strengthened, and his 
wants are supplied as soon as they are discovered ; and 
the use of the discovery is, that it enables him to derive 
from comparison the best proof of present happiness. 
A man born blind is ignorant of the pleasures of which 
he is deprived. After the restoration of his sight his 
happiness will be increased from two causes ; — from 
the delight he experiences at the novel accession of 
power, and from the contrast he will always be enabled 
to make between his two situations; long after the plea- 



sure of novelty has ceased. For these reasons, it is 
humane to restore him to sight. 

But ; hcwever beneficial to the general interests of 
mankind the civilization of barbarous countries may 
be, in this particular instance of it, the interest of 
Great Britain would seem to have been very little con- 
sulted. With fanciful schemes of universal good we 
have no business to meddle. Why are we to erect 

Eenitentiary houses and prisons at the distance of 
alf the diameter of the globe, and to incur the enor- 
mous expense of transporting their inhabitants to and 
at such a distance, it is extremely difficult to discover. 
It certainly is not from any deficiency of barren is- 
lands on our own coast, nor of uncultivated wastes in 
the interior ; and if we were sufficiently fortunate to 
be wanting in such species of accomodation, we might 
discover in Canada, or the West Indies, or on the 
coast of Africa, a climate malignant enough, or a soil 
sufficiently sterile, to revenge all the injuries which 
have been inflicted on society by pick-pockets, lar- 
cenists, and petty felons. Upon the foundation of a 
new colony, and especially one peopled by criminals, 
there is a disposition in Government (where any cir- 
cumstance in the commission of the crime affords the 
least pretence for the commutation) to convert capital 
punishment into transportation ; and by these means 
to hold forth a very dangerous, though certainly a 
very unintentional encouragement to offences. And 
when the history of the colony has been attentively 
perused in the parish of St. Giles, the ancient avoca- 
tion of picking pockets will certainly not become more 
discreditable from the knowledge that it may even- 
tually lead to the possession of a farm of a thousand 
acres on the river Hawkesbury. Since the benevolent 
Howard attacked our prisons, incarceration has not 
only become healthy but elegant ; and a county jail is 
precisely the place to which any pauper might wish 
to retire to gratify his taste for magnificence as well 
as for comfort. Upon the same principle, there is 
some risk that transportation will be considered as 
one of the surest roads to honour and to wealth ; and 
that no felon will hear a verdict of ' not guilty' without 
considering himself as cut off in the fairest career of 
prosperity. It is foolishly believed, that the colony 
of Botany Bay unites our moral and commercial inte- 
rests, and that we shall receive hereafter an ample 
equivalent, in bales of goods, for all the vices we ex- 
port. Unfortunately, the expenses we have incurred 
in founding the colony, will not retard the natural pro- 
gress of its emancipation, or prevent the attacks of 
other nations, who will be as desirous of reaping the 
fruit, as if they had sown the seed. It is a colony, 
besides, begun under every possible disadvantage ; it is 
too distant to be long governed, or well defended ; it 
is undertaken, not by the voluntary association of in- 
dividuals, but by Government, and by means of com- 
pulsory labour. A nation must, indeed, be redundant 
in capital, that will expend it where the hopes of a just 
return are so very small. 

It may be a very curious consideration what we are 
to do with this colony when it comes to years of dis- 
cretion. Are we to spend another hundred millions 
of money in discovering its strength, and to humble 
ourselves again before a fresh set of Washingtons 
and Franklins. The moment after we have suffered 
such serious mischief from the escape of the old tiger, 
we are breeding up a young cub, whom we cannot ren- 
cer less ferocious or more secure. If we are gradual- 
ly to manumit the colony, as it is more and more ca* 
pable of protecting itself, the degrees of emancipation, 
and the periods at which they are to take place, will 
be judged of very differently by the two nations. But 
we confess ourselves not to be so sanguine as to sup- 
pose, that a spirited and commercial people would, in 
spite of the example of America, ever consent to aban- 
don their sovereignty over an important colony with- 
out a struggle. Endless blood and treasure will be 
exhausted to support a tax on kangaroos' skins ; 
faithful Commons will go on voting fresh supplies to 
support a just and necessary war ; and Newgate, then 
become a quarter of the world, will evince a heroism, 
not unworthy of the great characters by whom she 
was originally peopled. 



16 



WORKS OF THE REV. SIDNEY SMITH. 



The experiment, however, is not less interesting in 
a moral, because it is objectionable in a commercial 
point of view. It is an object of the highest curiosity, 
thus to have the growth of a nation subjected to our 
examination ; to trace it by such faithful records, from 
the first day of its existence ; and to gather that 
knowledge of the progress of human affairs, from ac- 
tual experience, which is considered to be only ac- 
cessible to the conjectural reflections of enlightened 
minds. 

Human nature, under very old governments, is so 
trimmed, and pruned, and ornamented, and led into 
such a variety of factitious shapes, that we are almost 
ignorant of the appearance it would assume, if it were 
left more to itself. From such an experiment as that 
now before us, we shall be better able to appreciate 
what circumstances of our situation are owing to those 
permanent laws by which all men are influenced, and 
what to the accidental positions in which we have 
been placed. New circumstances will throw new 
light upon the effects of our religious, political, and 
economical institutions, if we cause them to be adop- 
ted as models in our rising empire ; and if we do not, 
we shall estimate the effects of their presence, by ob- 
serving those which are produced by their non-exist- 
ence. 

The history of the colony is at present, however, in 
its least interesting state, on account of the great pre- 
ponderance of depraved inhabitants, whose crimes and 
irregularities give a monotony to the narrative, which 
it cannot lose, till the respectable part of the com- 
munity come to bear a greater proportion to the crimi- 
nal. 

These Memoirs of Colonel Collins resume the history 
of the colony from the period at which he concluded 
it in his former volume, September, 1796, and conti- 
nue it down to August 1S01. They are written in the 
style of a journal, which though not the most agreeable 
mode of conveying information, is certainly the most 
authentic, and contrives to banish the suspicion, and 
most probably the reality, of the interference of a book- 
maker — a species of gentlemen who are now almost be- 
come necessary to deliver naval and military authors 
in their literary labours, though they do not always 
atone, by orthography and grammar, for the sacrifice of 
truth and simplicity. Mr. Collins's book appears to be 
written with great plainness and candour ; he appears to 
be a man always meaning well ; of good, plain, com- 
mon sense ; and composed of those well-wearing mate- 
rials which adapt a person for situations where genius 
and refinement would only prove a source of misery and 
of error. 

We shall proceed to lay before our readers an ana- 
lysis of the most important matter contained in this vo- 
lume. 

The natives in the vicinity of Port Jackson stand ex- 
tremely low, in point of civilization, when compared 
with many other savages with whom the discoveries of 
Captain Cook have made us acquainted. Their no- 
tions of religion exceed even that degree of absurdity 
which we are led to expect in the creed of a barbarous 
people. In politics they appear to be scarcely advan- 
ced beyond family-government. Huts they have none ; 
and, in all their economical inventions, there is a 
rudeness and deficiency of ingenuity, unpleasant, when 
contrasted with the instances of dexterity with which 
the descriptions and importations of our navigators 
have rendered us so familiar. Their numbers appear 
to us to be very small : a fact, at once, indicative 
either of the ferocity of manners in any people, or 
more probably, of the sterility of their country ; but 
which, in the present instance proceeds from both 
these causes. 

* Gaining every day (says Mr. Collins) some further 
knowledge of the inhuman habits and customs of these peo- 
ple, their being so thinly scattered through the country 
ceased to be a matter of surprise. It was almost daily seen, 
that from some trifling cause or other, they were continu- 
ally living in a state of warfare: to this must be added their 
brutal treatment of their women, who are themselves 
equally destructive to the measure of population, by the 
horrid and cruel custom of endeavouring to cause a miscar 
*iage, which their female acquaintances effect by pressing 
the body in such a way, as to destroy the infant in the 



womb; which violence not unfrequently occasions the 
death of the unnatural mother also. To this they have re- 
course to avoid the trouble of carrying the infant about 
when born, which, when it is very young, or at the breast, 
is the duty of the woman. The operation for this destruc- 
tive purpose is termed Mee-bra. The burying an infant 
(when at the breast) with the mother, if she should die, is 
another shocking cause of the thinness of population among 
them. The fact that such an operation as the Mee-bra was 
practised by these wretched people, was communicated by 
one of the natives to the principal surgeon of the settle 
ment.'— (p. 124, 125.) 

It is remarkable, that the same paucity of numbers 
has been observed in every part of New Holland which 
has hitherto been explored ; and yet there is not the 
smallest reason to conjecture that the population of it 
has been very recent j nor do the people bear any 
marks of descent from the inhabitants of the numerous 
islands by which this great continent is surrounded. 
The force of population can only be resisted by some 
great physical evils ; and many of the causes of this 
scarcity of human beings which Mr. Collins refers to 
the ferocity of the natives, are ultimately referable to 
the difficulty of support. We have always considered 
this phenomenon as a symptom extremely unfavoura- 
ble to the future destinies of this country. It is easy 
to launch out into eulogiums of the fertility of nature 
in particular spots ; but the most probable reason why 
a country that has been long inhabited, is not well in- 
habited, is, that it is not calculated to support many 
inhabitants without great labour. It is difficult to 
suppose any other causes powerful enough to resist the 
impetuous tendency of man, to obey that mandate for 
increase and multiplication, which has certainly been 
better observed than any other declaration of the Di- 
vine will ever revealed to us. 

There appears to be some tendency to civilization, 
and some tolerable notions of justice, in a practice very 
similar to our custom of duelling ; for duelling, though 
barbarous in civilized, is a highly civilized institution 
among barbarous people : and when compared to as- 
sassination, is a prodigious victory gained over human 
passions. Whoever kills another in the neighbourhood 
of Botany Bay, is compelled to appear at an appointed 
day before the friends of the deceased, and to sustain 
the attacks ot their missile weapons. If he is killed, 
he is deemed to have met with a deserved death ; if 
not, he is considered to have expiated the crime for 
the commission of which he was exposed to danger. 
There is in this institution a command over present 
impulses, a prevention of secrecy in the gratification 
of revenge, and a wholesome correction of that passion 
by the effect of public observation, which evince a su- 
periority to the mere animal passions ol ordinary sava- 
ges, and form such a contrast to the rest of the history 
of this people, that it may be considered as altogether 
an anomalous and inexplicable fact. The natives differ 
very much in the progress they have made in the arts 
of economy. Those to the north of Port Jackson 
evince a considerable degree of ingenuity and contri- 
vance in the structure of their houses, which are ren- 
dered quite impervious to the weather, while the in- 
habitants at Port Jackson have no houses at all. At 
Port Dalrymple, in Van Dieman's Land, there was eve- 
ry reason to believe the natives were unacquainted 
with the use of canoes ; a fact extremely embarrassing 
to those who indulge themselves in speculating on the 
genealogy of nations ; because it reduces them to the 
necessity of supposing that the progenitors of this in- 
sular people swam over from the main land, or that . 
they were aboriginal ; a species of dilemma, which 
effectually bars all conjecture upon the intermixture of ! 
nations. It is painful to learn, that the natives have 
begun to plunder and rob in so very alarming a man- 
ner that it has been repeatedly found necessary to fire 
upon them ; and many have, in consequence, fallen 
victims to their rashness. 

The soil is found to produce coal in vast abundance, ! 
salt, lime, very fine iron ore, timber fit for all purposes, 
excellent flax, and a tree, the bark of which is admira- 
bly adapted for cordage. The discovery of coal 
(which, by the by, we do not believe was ever before 
discovered so near the line) is probably rather a disad* 






AUSTRALIA. 



17 



vantage than an advantage ; because, as it lies extreme- 
ly favourable for sea carriage, it may prove to be a 
cheaper fuel than wood, and thus operate as a discour- 
agement to the clearing of lands. The soil upon the 
sea coast, has not been found to be very productive, 
though it improves in partial spots in the interior. The 
climate is healthy, in spite of the prodigious heat of 
the summer months, at which period the thermometer 
has been observed to stand in the shade at 107, and 
the leaves of garden vegetables to fall into dust, as it' 
they had been consumed with fire. But one of the 
most insuperable defects in New Holland, considered 
as the future country of a great people, is, the want of 
large rivers penetrating very far into the interior, and 
navigable for small crafts. The Hawkesbury, the 
largest river, yet discovered, is not accessible to boats 
for more than twenty miles. The same river occa- 
sionally rises above its natural level, to the astonishing 
height of fifty feet ; and has swept away more than 
once, the labours and the hopes of the new people ex- 
iled to its banks. 

The laborious acquisition of any good we have long 
enjoj'ed is apt to be forgotten. We walk, and talk, 
and run and read, without remembering the long and 
severe labour dedicated to the cultivation of these 
powers, the formidable obstacles opposed to our pro- 
gress, or the infinite satisfaction with which we over- 
came them. He who lives among a civilized people, 
may estimate the labour by which society has been 
brought into such a state by reading these annals of 
Botany Bay, the account of a whole nation exert- 
ing itself to new floor the government-house, repair the 
hospital, or build a wooden receptacle for stores. Yet 
the time may come, when some Botany Bay Tacitus 
shall record the crimes of an emperor lineally descend- 
ed from a London pick-pocket, or paint the valour with 
which he has led his New Hollanders into the heart of 
China. At that period, when the Grand Lahma is 
sending to supplicate alliance ; when the spice islands 
are purchasing peace with nutmegs ; when enormous 
tributes of green tea and nankeen are wafted into Port 
Jackson, and landed on the quays of Sydney, who will 
ever remember that the sawing of a few planks, and 
the knocking together a few nails, were such a serious 
trial of the energies and resources of the nation. 

The Government of the colony, after enjoying some 
little respite from this kind of labour, has begun 
to turn its attention to the coarsest and most neces- 
sary species of nr.au.ufactures, for which their wool 
appears to be well adapted. The state of stock in 
the whole settlement, in* Jane 1801, was about 7,000 
sheep, 1 ,300 head of cattle, 250 horses, and 5,000 hogs. 
There were under cultivation at the same time, be- 
tween 9 and 10,000 acres of corn. Three years and 
a-half before this, in December 1797, the numbers 
were as follows : — Sheep, 2,500 ; cattle, 350 ; horses, 
100 ; hogs, 4,300 ; acres of land in cultivation, 4,000. 
The temptation to salt pork, and sell it for Govern- 
ment store, is probably the reason why the breed of 
hogs has been so much kept under. The increase of 
cultivated lands between the two periods is prodigious. 
It appears (p. 319,) that the whole number of con- 
victs imported between January 1788 and June 1801 
(a period of thirteen years and a half,) has been about 
5,000, of whom 1 ,157 were females. The total amount 
of the population on the continent, as well as at Nor- 
folk Island, amounted, June 1801, to 6,500 persons ; 
of these 766 were children born at Port Jackson. In 
the returns from Norfolk Island, children are not dis- 
criminated from adults. Let us add to the imported 
population of 5,000 convicts, 500 free people, which 
(if we consider that a regiment of soldiers has been 
kept up there) is certainly a very small allowance ; 
then, in thirteen years and. a half, the imported popu- 
lation has increased only by two-thirteenths. If we 
suppose that something more than a fifth of the free 
people were women, this will make the total of women 
1,270 ; of whom we may fairly presume that 800 were 
capable of child-bearing ; and if we suppose the chil- 
dren of Norfolk Island to bear the same proportion to 
the adults as at Port Jackson, their total number at 



high eulogiums which have been made on th* fertility 
of the female sex in the climate of New Holland. 

The Governor, who appears on all occasions to be 
an extremely well-dis, oscd man, is not quite so con- 
versant in the best wk tings on political economy as 
we could wish : and indeed (though such knowledge 
would be extremely serviceable to the interests which 
this Romulus of the Southern Pole is superintending,) 
it is rather unfair to exact from a superintendent of 
pick-pockets, that he should be a philosopher. In the 
18th page we have the following information respect- 
ing the price of labour :— 

'Some representations having been made to the Go- 
vernor from the settlers in different parts of the colony, 
purporting that the wages demanded by the free labouring- 
people, whom they had occasion to hire, were so exorbitant 
as to run away with the greatest part of the profit of their 
farms, it was recommended to them to appoint quarterly 
meetings among themselves, to be held in each district, for 
the purpose of settling the rate of wages to labourers in 
every different kind of work ; that, to this end, a written, 
agreement should be entered into, and subscribed by each 
settler, a breach of which should be punished by a penalty, 
to be fixed by the general opinion, and made recoverable in. 
a court of civil judicature. It was recommended to them to 
apply this forfeiture to the common benefit; and they were 
to transmit to the head-quarters a copy -of their agreement, 
with the rate of wages which they should from time to time 
establish, for the Governor's information, holding their first 
meeting as early as possible.' 

And again, at p. 24, the following arrangements on 
that head are enacted : — 

' In pursuance of the order which was issued in January 
last recommending the settlers to appoint meetings, at 
which they should fix the rate of wages that it might be 
proper to pay for the different kinds of labour which their 
farms should require, the settlers had submitted to the Go- 
vernor the several resolutions that they had entered mto, 
by which he was enabled to fix a rate that he conceived to 
be fair and equitable between the farmer and the labourer. 



'The following 
ed, viz. 



prices of labour were now establish^ 



Felling forest timber, per acre - 

Ditto in brush ground, ditto - 

Burning off open ground, ditto - 

Ditto brush ground, ditto - 

Breaking up new groimd, ditto - 

Chipping fresh ground, ditto - 

Chipping in wheat, ■ ditto ... 

Breaking up stubble or corn ground, 1 l-4d. 
per rod, or ditto - 

Planting Indian corn, ditto - 

Hilling ditto ditto - 

Reaping wheat, ditto - 

Thrashing ditto, per bushel, 

Pulling and husking Indian corn,per bushel 

Splitting paling of seven feet long^per h'd 

Ditto of five feet long, ditto 

Sawing plank, ditto 

Ditching, per rod, three feet wide and three 
feet deep » 

Carriage of wheat, per bushel, per mile - 

Ditto Indian corn, neat .... 

Yearly wages for labour, with board 

Wages per week, with provisions, consist- 
ing of 3 lb. of salt pork, or 6 lb. of fresh, 
and 21 lb. of wheat with vegetables 

A day's wages with board .... 

Ditto without board 

A government-man allowed to officers or 
settlers in their own time 

Price of an axe 

New steeling ditto * 

A new hoe 

A sickle 

Hire of a boat to carry grain per day 

'The settlers were reminded, that, in order to prevent 
any kind of dispute between the master and servant, when 
they should have occasion to hire a man for any length of 
time, they would find it most convenient to engage him 



£ 


s. 


d 





9 








10 


6 


1 


5 





1 


10 





1 


4 








12 


3 





7 





16 


8 





7 








7 





10 











9 








6 





3 








1 


6 





7 











10 








2 








3 


10 











6 








1 








2 


6 





10 





2 











6 





1 


9 





1 


6 





5 






tne aouits as at Fori jacKSon, ineir roiai nunmer ax for a quar ter, half-year, or year, and to make their agrea- 
both settlements will be 913 ;— a state of infantine ment in writing ; on which, should any dispute arise, an 
population which certainly does not justify the very ' appeal to the magistrates would settle it.* 



IS 



WORKS OF THE REV. SIDNEY SMITE. 



This is all very bad ; and if the Governor had cher- 
ished the intention of destroying the colony, he could 
have done nothing more detrimental to its interests. 
The high price of labour is the very corner-stone on 
which the prosperity of a new colony depends. It 
enables the poor man to live with ease ; and is the 
strongest incitement to population, by rendering chil- 
dren rather a source of riches than of poverty. If the 
same difficulty of subsistence existed in new countries 
as in old, it is plain that the progress of population 
would be equally slow in each. The very circum- 
stances which cause the difference are, that, in the 
latter, there is a competition among the labourers to 
be employed ; and, in the former, a competition among 
the occupiers of land to obtain labourers. In the one, 
land is scarce and men plenty ; in the other, men are 
scarce and land is plenty. To disturb this natural 
order of things (a practice injurious at all times) must 
be particularly so where the predominant disposition 
of the colonist is an aversion to labour, produced by a 
j.ong course of dissolute habits. In such cases the 
high prices of labour, which the Governor was so de- 
sirous of abating, bid fair not only to increase the 
agricultural prosperity, but to effect the moral refor- 
mation of the colony. We observe the same unfor- 
tunate ignorance of the elementary principles of com- 
merce in the attempts of the Governor to reduce the 
prices of the European commodities, by bulletins and 
authoritative interference, as if there were any other 
mode of lowering the price of an article (while the 
demand continues the same) but by increasing its 
quantity. The avaricious love of gain, which is so 
feelingly deplored, appears to us a principle which, 
in able hands, might be guided to the most salutary 
purposes. The object is to encourage the love of 
labour, which is best encouraged by the love of money. 
We have very great doubts on the policy of reserving 
the best timber on the estates as government timber. 
Such a reservation would probably operate as a check 
upon the clearing of lands without attaining the*object 
desired ; for the timber, instead of being immediately 
cleared, would be slowly destroyed, by the neglect or 
malice of the settlers whose lands it encumbered. 
Timber is such a drug in new countries, that it is ai 
any time to be purchased for little more than the 
labour of cutting. To secure a supply of it by vexa- 
tious and invidious laws, is surely a work of superero- 
gation and danger. The greatest evil which the 
government has yet had to contend with is, the inor- 
dinate use of spirituous liquors ; a passion which puts 
the interests of agriculture at variance with those of 
morals: for a dram-drinker will consume as much 
corn in the form of alcohol, in one day, as would 
supply him with bread for three; and thus, by his 
vices, opens an admirable market to the industry of a 
new settlement. The only mode, we believe, of en- 
countering this evil, is by deriving from it such a 
revenue as will not admit of smuggling. Beyond this 
it is almost invincible by authority ; and it is probably 
to be cured only by the progressive refinement of 
manners. 

To evince the increasing commerce of the settle- 
ment, a list is subjoined of 140 ships, which have 
arrived there since its first foundation, forty only of 
which were from England. The colony at Norfolk 
Island is represented to be in a very deplorable situa- 
tion, and will most probably be abandoned for one 
about to be formed on Van Diemen's Land,* though 
the capital defect of the former settlement has been 
partly obviated, by a discovery of the harbour for 
small craft. 

The most important and curious information con- 
tained in this volume, is the discovery of straits which 
separate Van Diemen's Land (hitherto considered as 
its southern extremity) from New Holland. For this 
discovery we are indebted to Mr. Bass, a.surgeon, after 



* It is singular that Governments a?e not more desirous of 
pushing their settlements rather to the north than the south 
of Port Jackson. The soil and climate would probably im- 
prove, in the latitude nearer the equator ; and settlements 
in that position would be more contiguous to our Indian 
colonies. 



whom the straits have been named, and Who was led 
to a suspicion of their existence by a prodigious swell 
which he observed to set in from the westward, at the 
mouth of the opening which he had reached on a 
voyage of discovery, prosecuted in a common whale- 
boat. To verify this suspicion, he proceeded after- 
wards in a vessel of 25 tons, 'accompanied by Mr. 
Flanders, a naval gentleman ; and, entering the straits 
between the latitudes of 39° and 40° south, actually 
circumnavigated Van Diemen's Land. Mr. Bass's 
ideas of the importance of this discovery, we shall 
give from his narrative, as reported by Mr. Collins. 

' The most prominent advantage which seemed likely to 
accrue to the settlement from this discovery was, the expe- 
diting of the passage from the Cape of Good Hope to Port 
Jackson; for, although a line drawn from the Cape to 44° 
of south latitude, and to the longitude of the South Cape of 
Van Diemen's Land, would not sensibly differ from one 
drawn to the latitude of 40° to the same longitude; yet it 
must be allowed, that a ship will be four degrees nearer to 
Port Jackson in the latter situation than it would be in the 
former. But there is, perhaps, a greater advantage to be 
gained by making a passage through the strait, than the 
mere saving of four degrees of latitude along the coast. 
The major part of the ships that have arrived at Fort Jack- 
son have met with N. E. winds, on opening the sea round 
the South Cape and Cape Pillar; and have been so much 
retarded by them, that a fourteen days' passage to the port 
is reckoned to be a fair one, although the difference of lati- 
tude is but ten degrees, and the most prevailing winds at 
the latter place are from S. E. to S. in summer," and from 
W. S. W. to S. in winter. If, by going through Bass Strait, 
these N. E. winds can be avoided, which in many cases 
would probably be the case, there is no doubt but a week or 
more would be gained by it ; and the expense, with the 
wear and tear of the ship for one week, are objects to most 
owners, more especially when freighted with convicts by 
the run. 

' This strait likewise presents another advantage. From 
the prevalence of the N. E. and easterly winds off the South 
Cape, many suppose that a passage may be made from 
thence to the westward, either to the Cape of Good Hore, 
or to India ; but the fear of the great unknown bight . 
tween the South Cape and the^S. W. Cape of Lewen 1 . 
Land, lying in about 35° south and 113°- east, has hitherto 
prevented the trial being made. Now, the strait removes a 
part of this danger, by presenting a certain place of retreat, 
should a gale oppose itself to the ship in the first part of the 
essay : and should the wind come at S. W. she need not 
fear making a good stretch to the W. N. W. which course, 
if made good, is within a few degrees of going clear of alh 
There is, besides, King George the Third's Sound, discov- 
ered by Captain Vancouver, situate in the latitude of 35 c 30' 
south, and longitude 11S° 12' east; and it is to be hoped, 
that a few years will disclose many others upon the coast, as 
well as the confirmation or futility of the conjecture that a 
still larger than Bass Strait dismembers New Holland.' — 
(p. 192, 193.) 

We learn from a note subjoined to this passage, 
that, in order to verify or refute this conjecture, of 
the existence of other important inlets on the west 
coast of New Holland, Captain Flinders has sailed 
with two ships under his command, and is said to be 
accompanied by two professional men of considerable 
ability. 

Such are the most important contents of Mr. Col- 
lins's book, the style of which we very much approve, 
because it appears to be written by himself ; and we 
must repeat again, that nothing can be more injurious 
to the opinion the public will form of the authenticity 
of a book of this kind, than the suspicion that it has 
been tricked out and embellished by other hands 
Such men, to be sure, have existed as Julius Caesar, 
but, in general, a correct and elegant style is hardly 
attainable by those who have passed their lives in 
action : and no one has such a pedantic love of go Dd 
writing, as to prefer mendacious finery to rough and 
ungrammatical truth. The events which Mr. Collins's 
book records, we have read with great interest. There 
is a charm in thus seeing villages, and churches, and 
farms, rising from a wilderness, where civilized mau 
has never set his foot since the creation of the world 
The contrast between fertility and barrenness, popu- 
lation and solitude, activity and indolence, fills the 
mind with the pleasing images of happiness and in- 
crease. Man seems to move in his proper sphere 
while he is thus dedicating the powers of his mind and 



J. FIEVEE. 



19 



body to reap those rewards which the bountiful Author 
of all things has assigned to his industry. Neither is 
it any common enjoyment, to turn for a while from 
the memory of those distractions which have so 
recently agitated the Old World, and to reflect that 
its very horrors and crimes may have thus prepared a 
long era of opulence and peace for a people yet in- 
volved in the womb of time. 



J. FIEVEE. (Edinburgh Review, 1809.) 
Lettres sur VAnfrteterre. Par J. Fievee. 1802. 



Of all the species of travels, that which has moral 
ibservation for its object is the most liable to error, 
And has the greatest difficulties to overcome, before it 
^an arrive at excellence. Stones and roots, and leaves, 
are subjects which may exercise the understanding 
without rousing the passions. A mineralogical travel- 
ler will hardly fall fouler upon the granite and the 
feldspar of other countries than his own ; a botanist 
will not conceal its non-descripts ; and an agricultural 
tourist will faithfully detail the average crop per acre ; 
but the traveller who observes on the manners, habits, 
and institutions of other countries, must have emanci- 
pated his mind from the extensive and powerful do- 
minion of association, must have extinguished the 
agreeable and deceitful feelings of national vanity, 
and cultivated that patient humility which builds ge- 
neral inferences only upon the repetition of individual 
facts. Every thing he sees shocks some passion or 
flatters it ; and he is perpetually seduced to distort 
facts, so as to render them agreeable to his system 
and his feelings ! Books of travels are now pnblished 
in such vast abundance, that it may not be useless, 
perhaps, to state a few of the reasons why their value 
so commonly happens to be in the inverse ratio of their 
number. 

1st, Travels are bad, from a want of opportunity 
for observation in those who write them. If the sides 
of a building are to be measured, and the number of 
its windows to be counted, a very short space of time 
may suffice for these operations ; but to gain such a 
knowledge of their prevalent opinions and propensi- 
ties, as will enable a stranger to comprehend (what is 
commonly called) the genius of people, requires a long 
residence among them, a familiar acquaintance with 
their language, and an easy circulation amgng their 
various societies. The society into which a transient 
stranger gains the most easy access in any country, is 
not often that which ought to stamp the national cha- 
racter ; and no criterion can be more fallible , in a peo- 
ple so reserved and inaccessible as the British, who 
(even when they open their doors to letters of intro- 
duction) cannot for years overcome the awkward 
timidity of their nature. The same expressions are 
of so different a value in different countries, the same 
actions proceed from such different causes, and pro- 
duce such different effects, that a judgment of foreign 
nations, founded on rapid observation, is almost cer- 
tainly a mere tissue of ludicrous and disgraceful mis- 
takes ; and yet a residence of a month or two seems to 
entitle a traveller to present the world with a picture 
of manners in London, Paris, or Vienna, and even to 
dogmatize upon the political, religious, and legal in- 
stitutions, as if it were one and the same thing to 
speak of the abstract effects of such institutions, and 
of their effects combined with all the peculiar circum- 
stances in which any nation may be placed. 

2dly, An affectation of quickness in observation, an 
intuitive glance that requires only a moment, and a 
part, to judge of a perpetuity and a whole. The late 
Mr. Petion, who was sent over into this country to ac- 
quire a knowledge of our criminal law, is said to have 
declared himself thoroughly informed upon the sub- 
ject, after remaining precisely two and thirty minutes 
in the Old Bailey. 

3dly, The tendency to found observation on a sys- 
tem, rather than a system upon observation. The fact 
Is, there are very few original eyes and ears. The 
preat mass see and hear as they are directed by others, 



and bring back from a residence in foreign countries 
nothing but the vague and customary notions concern- 
ing it, which are carried and brought back for half a 
century, without verification or change. The most 
ordinary shape in which this tendency to prejudge 
makes its appearance among travellers, is by a dispo- 
sition to exalt, or, a still more absurd disposition, to 
depreciate their native country. They are incapable 
of considering a foreign people but under one single 
point of view — the relation in which they stand to 
their own ; and the whole narrative is frequently no- 
thing more than a mere triumph of national vanity, or 
the ostentation of superiority to so common a failing. 

But we are wasting our time in giving a theory of 
the faults of travellers, when we have such ample 
means of exemplifying them all from the publication 
now before us, in which Mr. Jacob Fievee, with the 
most surprising talents for doing wrong, has contrived 
to condense and agglomerate every species of absurd- 
ity that has hitherto been made known, and even to 
launch out occasionally into new regions of nonsense, 
with a boldness which well entitles him to the merit 
of originality in folly, and discovery in impertinence. 
We consider Mr. Fievee's book as extremely valuable 
in one point of view. It affords a sort of limit or mind- 
mark, beyond which we conceive it to be impossible 
in future that pertness and petulance should pass. It 
is wefl to be acquainted with the boundaries of our 
nature on both sides ; and to Mr. Fievee we are in- 
debted for this valuable approach to pessimism. The 
height of knowledge no man has yet scanned ; but we 
have now pretty well fathomed the gulf of ignorance. 
We must, however, do justice to Mr. Fievee when 
he deserves it. He evinces, in his preface, a lurking 
uneasiness at the apprehension of exciting war between, 
the two countries, from the anger to which his letters 
will give birth in England. He pretends to deny that 
they will occasion a war ; but it is very easy to see he 
is not convinced by his own arguments ; and we con- 
fess ourselves extremely pleased by this amiable soli- 
citude at the probable effusion of human blood. We 
hope Mr. Fievee is deceived by his philanthropy, and 



that no such unhappy consequences will ensue, as he 
really believes, though he affects to deny them We 
dare to say the dignity of this country will be satis- 
fied, if the publication in question is disowned by the 
French government, or, at most, if the author is given 
up. At all events, we have no scruple to say, that to 
sacrifice twenty thousand lives, and a hundred millions 
of money, to resent Mr. Fievee's book, would be an 
unjustifiable waste of blood and treasure ; and that to 
take him off privately by assassination, would be an 
undertaking hardly compatible with the dignity of a 
great empire. 

To show, however, the magnitude of the provoca- 
tion, we shall specify a few of the charges which he 
makes against the English : that they do not under- 
stand fireworks as well as the French ; that they 
charge a shilling for admission to the exhibition ; that 
they have the misfortune of being incommoded by a 
certain disgraceful privilege, called the liberty of the 
press ; that the opera band plays out of tune ; that the 
English are so fond of drinking, that they get drunk 
with a certain air called the gas of Paradise ; that the 
privilege of electing members of parliament is so bur- 
thensome, that cities sometimes petition to be ex- 
empted from it ; that the great obstacle to a parlia- 
mentary reform is the mob ; that women sometimes 
have titles distinct from those of their husbands — al- 
though, in England, any body can sell his wife at 
market, with a rope about her neck. To these com- 
plaints he adds — that the English are so far from en- 
joying that equality of which their partisans boast, 
that none but the servants of the higher nobility can 
carry canes behind a carriage ; that the power which 
the French kings had of pardoning before trial, is 
much the same thing as the English mode of pardon ■ 
ing after trial ; that he should conceive it to be a good 
reason for rejecting any measure in France, that it 
was imitated from the English, who have no family 
affections, and who love money so much, that their 
first question, in an inquiry concerning the character 
of any man, is, as to his degree ei fortune. Lastly, 



20 



WORKS OF THE REV. SIDNEY SMITH. 



Mr. Fievee alleges against the English, that they have 
great pleasure in contemplating the spectacle of men 
deprived of their reason. And indeed we must have 
the candour to allow, that the hospitality which Mr. 
Fievee experienced, seems, to afford some pretext for 
this assertion. 

One of the principal objects of Mr. Fievee's book, is 
to combat the Anglomania, which has raged so long 
among his countrymen, and which prevailed at Paris 
to such an excess, that even Mr. Neckar, a foreigner 
(incredible as it may seem) after having been twice 
minister of France, retained a considerable share of 
admiration for the English government. This is quite 
inexplicable. But this is nothing to the treason of the 
Encyclopedists, who, instead of attributing the merit of 
the experimental philosophy and the reasoning by in- 
duction to a Frenchman, have shown themselves so lost 
to all sense of duty which they owed to their country, 
that they have attributed it to an Englishman,* of the 
name of Bacon, and this for no better reason, than that 
he really was the author of it. The whole of this pas- 
sage, is written so entirely in the genius of Mr. Fievee, 
and so completely exemplifies that very caricature spe- 
cies of Frenchmen from which our gross and popular 
notions of the whole people are taken, that we shall 
give the whole passage at full length, cautiously ab- 
staining from the sin of translating it. 

1 Quand je reproche aux philosophes d'avoir vante 1' An- 
gleterre, par haine pour les institutions qui soutenoient la 
France, je ne hasarde rien, et je fournirai une nouvelle 
preuve de cette assertion, en citan les encyclopedistes, chefs 
avoues de la philosophie moderne. 

' Comment nous ont-ils presente l'Encyclopedie ? Comme 
•an monument immortel, comme le depot precieux de 
toutes les connoissances humains. Sous quel patronage 
l'ont-ils eleve ce monument immortel? Est ce sous l'egide 
das ecrivains dont la France s'honoroit ? Non, ils ont 
choisi pour maitre et pour idole un Anglais, Bacon ; ils lui 
on fait dire tout ce qu'ils ont voulu, parce que cet auteur 
extraordinairement volumineux, n'etoit pas connu en 
France, et ne l'est guere en Angleterre que de quelques 
itommes studieux ; mais les philosophes scntoient que leur 
succ&s, pour introduire des nouveautes, tenoit a faire croire 
qu' eUes n'etoient pas neuves pour les grands esprits ; et com- 
lae les grands esprits Francais, trop connus, ne ce pretoient 
pas a un pareil dessein, les philosophes ont eu recours a 
1' Angleterre. Ainsi, un ouvrage fait en France, et oftert a 
i'admiration de l'Europe comme l'ouvrage par excellence, 
fut mis par des Francais sous la protection du genie Anglais. 
O honte! Et les philosophes se sont dit patriotes, et la 
Fiance, peur prix desa degradation, leur a eleve des statues! 
La siecle qui commence," plus juste, parce qu'il a le senti- 
ment de la veritable grandeur, liassera ces statues et l'Ency- 
dopedie s'ensevelir sous la meme poussiere.' 

When to this are added the commendations that 
have been bestowed upon Newton, the magnitude and 
the originality of the discoveries which have been 
attributed to him, the admiration which the words of 
Locke have excited, and the homage that has been 
paid to Milton and Shakspeare, the treason which 
lurks at the bottom of it all will not escape the pene- 
trating glance of Mr. Fievee ; and he will discern that 
same cause, from which every good Frenchman knows 
the defeat of Aboukir and of the first of June to have 
proceeded — the monster Pitt, and his English guineas. 



EDGEWORTH ON BULLS. (Edinburgh Review, 
1803.) 

Essay on Irish Bulls. By Richard Lovell Edgeworth and 
Maiia Edgeworth. London, 1802. 

We hardly know what to say about this rambling, 
scrambling book ; but that we are quite sure the author, 
when he began any sentence in it, had not the smallest 
suspicion ot what it was about to contain. We say the 
author ; because, in spite of the mixture of sexes in the 
title-page, we are strongly inclined to suspect that the 
male contributions exceed the female in a very great de- 
aree. The essay on Bulls is written much with the same 
mind, and in the same manner, as a schoolboy takes 

* «Gaul was conquered by a person of the name of Julius 
Caesar,' is the first phrase in one of Mr. Newberry's little 
books.: 



a walk : he moves on for ten yards on the straight 
road, with surprising perseverance ; then sets out after 
a butterfly, looks for a bird's nest, or jumps back- 
wards and forwards over a ditch. In the same man- 
ner, this nimble and digressive gentleman is away after 
every object which crosses his mind. If you leave 
him at the end of a comma, in a steady pursuit of his 
subject, you are sure to find him, before the next full 
stop, a hundred yards to the right or left, frisking, 
capering, and grinning in a high paroxysm of merri- 
ment and agility. Mr. Edgeworth seems to possess 
the sentiments of an accomplished gentleman, the in- 
formation of a scholar, and the vivacity of a first-rate 
harlequin. He is fuddled with animal spirits, giddy 
with constitutional joy ; in such a state he must have 
written on, or burst. A discharge of ink was an eva- 
cuation absolutely necessary, to avoid fatal and ple- 
thoric congestion. 

The object of the book is to prove, that the practice 
of making bulls is not more imputable to the Irish 
than to any other people ; and the maimer in which 
he sets about it, is to quote examples of bulls juoduced 
in other countries. But this is surely a singular way of 
reasoning the question: for there are goitres out of 
Valais, extortioners who do not worship Moses, oat 
cakes out of the Tweed, and balm beyond the pre- 
cincts of Gilead. If nothing can be said to exist pre- 
eminently and emphatically in one country, which 
exists at all in another, then Frenchmen are not gay, 
nor Spaniards grave, nor are gentlemen of the Mile- 
sian race remarkable for their disinterested con- 
tempt of wealth in their connubial relations. It is 
probable there is some foundation for a charactei 
so generally diffused ; though it is also probable that 
such foundation is extremely enlarged by fame. If 
there were no foundation for the common opinion, 
we must suppose national characters formed by 
chance; and that the Irish might, by accident, have 
been laughed at as bashful and sheepish, which 
is impossible. The author puzzles himself a good 
deal about the nature of bulls, without coming to 
any decision about the matter. Though the ques- 
tion is not a very easy one, we shall venture to 
say, that a bull is an apparent congruity, and real 
incongruity, of ideas, suddenly discovered. And if 
this account of bulls be just, they are (as might have 
been supposed) the very reverse of wit ; for as wit 
discovers real relations, that are not apparent, bulls 
admit apparent relations that are not real. The plea- 
sure arising from wit proceeds from our surprise at 
suddenly discovering two things to be similar, in which 
we susoect no similarity. The pleasure arising from 
balls proceeds from discovering two things to be dis- 
similar, in which a resemblance might have been sus- 
pected. The same doctrine will apply to wit, and to 
bulls in action. Practical wit discovers connection or 
relation between actions, in which duller understand- 
ings discover none ; and practical bulls originate from 
an apparent relation between two actions, which more 
correct understandings immediately perceive to have 
no relation at all. 

Louis XIV. being extremely harrassed by the re- 
peated solicitations of a veteran officer for promotion, 
said one day, loud enough to be heard, < That gentle- 
man is the most troublesome officer I have in my 
service.' < That is precisely the charge (said the old 
man) which your Majesty's enemies bring against 
me.' 

<■ An English gentleman,' (says Mr. Edgeworth, in a story 
cited from Joe Millar,) ' was writing a letter in a coffee- 
house ; and perceiving that an Irishman stationed behind 
him was taking that liberty which Paimenio used with his 
friend Alexander, instead of putting his seal upon the lips 
of the curious impertinent, the English gentleman thought 
proper to reprove the Hibernian, if not with delicacy, at 
least with poetical justice. He concluded writing his letter 
in these words: "I would say more, but a damned tall 
Irishman is reading over my shoulder every word I write." 

1 " You lie, you scoundrel," said the self -convicted Hiber 
nian.'— (p. 29.) 

The pleasure derived from the first of these stories, 
proceeds from the discovery of the relation that subsists 
between the object he had m view, and the assent of the 
officer to an observation so unfriendly to that end. Iu 



EDGWORTH ON BULLS. 



the first rapid glance which the mind throws upon his 
Words, he appears, by his acquiescence, to be pleading 
against himself. There seems to be no relation be- 
tween what he says, and what he wishes to effect by 
speakicg. 

In the second story, the pleasure is directly the re- 
verse. The lie given was apparently the readiest 
means of proving his innocence, and really the most 
actual way of establishing his guilt. There seems for 
a moment to be a strong relation between the means 
and the object ; while, in -fact, no irrelation can be so 
complete. 

What connection is there between pelting stones at 
monkeys, and gathering cocoa-nuts from lofty trees ? 
Apparently none. But monkeys sit upon cocoa-nut- 
trees ; monkeys are imitative animals ; and if you 
pelt a monkey with a stone, he pelts you with a cocoa- 
nut hi return. This scheme of gathering cocoa-nuts is 
very witty, and would be more so if it did not appear 
useful : for the idea of utility is always mimical to the 
idea of wit.* There appears, on the contrary, to be 
some relation between the revenge of the Irish rebels 
against a banker, and the means which they took to 
gratify it, by burning all his notes wherever they 
found them ; whereas, they could not have rendered 
him a more essential service. In both these cases of 
bulls, the one verbal, the other practical, there is an 
apparent congruity, and real incongruity of ideas. In 
both the cases of wit, there is an apparent incongruity 
and a real relation. 

It is clear that a bull cannot depend upon mere 
incongruity alone ; for if a man were to say that he 
would ride to London upon a cocked hat, or that he 
would cut his throat with a pound of pickled salmon, 
this, though completely incongruous, would not be to 
make bulls, but to talk nonsense. The stronger the 
apparent connection, and the more complete the real 
disconnection of the ideas, the greater the surprise, 
and the better the bull. The less apparent, and the 
more complete the relations established by wit, the 
higher gratification does it afford. A great deal 
of the pleasure experienced from bulls^ proceeds 
from the sense of superiority in ourselves. Bulls 
which we invented, or knew to be invented, might 
please, but in a less degree, for want of this addition- 
al zest. 

As there must be apparent connection, and real 
recongruity, it is seldom that a man of sense and edu- 
cation finds any form of words by which he is con- 
scious that he might have been deceived into a bull. 
To conceive how the person has been deceived, he 
must suppose a degree of information very different 
from, and a species of character very heterogeneous to, 
his own ; a process which diminishes surprise, and 
consequently pleasure. In the above-mentioned story 
of the Irishman overlooking the man writing, no per- 
son of ordinary sagacity can suppose himself betrayed 
into such a mistake ; but he can easily represent to 
himself a kind of character that might have been so 
betrayed. There are some bulls so extremely falla- 
cious, that any man may imagine himself to have 
been betrayed into them , but these are rare : and, in 
general, it is a poor, contemptible species of amuse- 
ment, a delight in which evinces a very bad taste in wit. 

* It must be observed, that all the great passions, and 
many other feelings, extinguish the relish for wit. Thus 
lympha pudica Deum vidit et erebuit, would be witty, were it 
not bordering on the sublime. The resemblance between 
the sandal tree imparting (while it falls) its aromantic fla- 
vour to the edge of the axe, and the benevolent man re- 
warding evil with good, would be witty, did it not excite 
virtuous emotions. There are many mechanical contriv- 
ances which excite sensations very similar to wit; but the 
attention is absorbed by their utility. Some of .Merlin's 
machines, which have no utility at all, are quite similar to 
wit. A small model of a steam-engine, or mere squirt, is 
wit to a child. A man speculates on the causes of the first, 
or in its consequences, and so loses the feelings of wit : with 
the latter, he is too familiar to be surprised. In short, the 
essence of every species of wit is surprise ; which vi termini, 
must be sudden ; and the sensations which wit has a ten- 
dency to excite, are impaired or destroyed as often as they 
ere mingled with much thought or passion, 



Whether the Irish make more bulls than their 
neighbours, is, as we have before remarked, not a 
point of much importance ; but it is of considerable 
importance that the character of a nation should not 
be degraded ; and Mr. Edgeworth has great merit in 
his very benevolent intention of doing justice to the 
excellent qualities of the Irish. It is not possible to 
read his book without feeling a strong and new dispo- 
sition in their favour. Whether the imitation of the 
Irish manner be correct in his little stories, we can- 
not determine ; but we feel the same confidence hi the 
accuracy of the imitation, that is often felt in the 
resemblance of a portrait, of which we have never seen 
the original. It is no very high compliment to Mr. 
Edgeworth's creative powers, to say, he could not have 
formed anything, which was not real, so like reality ; 
but such a remark only robs Peter to pay Paul ; and 
gives everything to his powers of observation which it 
takes from those of his imagination. In truth, no- 
thing can be better than his imitation of the Irish 
manner : it is first-rate painting. 

Edgeworth and Co. have another faculty in great 
perfection. They are eminently masters of the pathos. 
The Firm drew tears from us in the stories of little 
Dominick, and of the Irish beggar who killed his 
sweetheart : Never was any grief more natural or 
simple. The first, however, ends in a very foolish 
way; 

-formosa superne 

Desinit in piscem. 

We are extremely glad that our avocation did not 
call us from Bath to London on the day that the Bath 
coach-conversation took place. We except from this 
wish the story with which the conversation termi- 
nates ; for as soon as Mr. Edgeworth enters upon a 
story he excels. 

We must confess we have been much more pleased 
with Mr. Edgeworth in his laughing and in his pathe- 
tic, than in his grave and reasoning moods. He meant, 
perhaps, that we should ; and it certainly is not very 
necessary that a writer should be profound on the 
subject of bulls. Whatever be the deficiencies of the 
book, they are, in our estimation, amply atoned for by 
its merits ; by none more than that lively feeling of 
compassion which pervades it for the distresses of the 
wild, kind-hearted, blundering poor of Ireland. 



TRIMMER AND LANCASTER.* (Edinburgh 
Review, 1806.) 

JL Comparative View of the New Plan of Education promul- 
gated by Mr. Joseph Lancaster, in his Tracts concerning 
the Instruction of the Children of the Labouring Part of the 
Community ; and. of the Syste'm of Christian Education 
founded by our pious Forefathers for the Initiation of the 
Young Members of the Established Church in the Principles 
of the Reformed Religion. By Mrs. Trimmer. 1805. 

This is a book written by a lady who has gained 
considerable reputation at the Corner of St. "Paul's 
Churchyard ; who flames in the van of Mr. Newbury's 
shop ; and is, upon the whole, dearer to mothers and 
aunts than any other who pours the milk of science 
into the mouths of babes and sucklings. Tired at last 
of scribbling for children, and getting ripe in ambition, 
she has now written a book for grown-up people, and 
selected for her antagonist as stiff a controversialist as 
the whole field of dispute could well have supplied. 
Her opponent is Mr. Lancaster, a Quaker, who has 
lately given to the world new and striking fights upon 
the subject of Education, and come forward to the 
notice of his country by spreading order, knowledge, 
and innocence among the lowest of mankind. 

Mi. Lancaster, she says, wants method in his book; 



* Lancaster invented the new method of education. The 
Church was sorely vexed at his success,, endeavoured to set 
up Dr. Bell as the discoverer, and to run down poor Lan 
caster. George the Third was irritated by this shabby con 
duct, and always protected Lancaster. He was delighted 
with this Review, and made Sir Herbert Taylor read it a 
second time to him 



22 



WORKS On THE REV. SIDNEY SMITH. 



and therefore her answer to him is without any ar- 
rangement The same excuse must suffice for the 
desultory observations we shall make upon this lady's 
publication. 

The first sensation of disgust we experienced at Mrs. 



of vice ; if the associates of youth pour contempt on 
the liar ; he will soon hide his head with shame, and 
most likely leave off the practice.' — (p. 24, 25.) 

The objection which Mrs. Trimmer makes to this 
passage, is that it is exalting the fear of man above the 



Trimmer's book, was from the patronizing and pro- \fear of God. This observation is as mischievous as it 



tecting air with which she speaks of some small part of 
Mr. Lancaster's plan. She seems to suppose, because 
she has dedicated her mind to the subject, that her 
opinion must necessarily be valuable upon it ; forget- 
ting it to be barely possible that her application may 
have made her more wrong, instead of more right. If 
she can make out her case, that Mr. Lancaster is do- 
mg mischief in so important a point as that of nation- 
al education, she has a right, in common with every 
one else, to lay her complaint before the public ; but a 
light to publish praises must be earned by something 
iwre difficult than the writing sixpenny books for chil- 
dren. This may be very good ; though we never re- 
member to have seen any one of them ; but if they 
be no more remarkable for judgment and discretion 

{girts of the work before us, there are many 
thriving children quite capable of repaying the obli- 
gations they owe to their amiable^ instructress, and of 
teaching, with grateful retaliation, ' the old idea how 
to shoot.' 
In remarking upon the work before us, we shall ex- 

i ollow the plan of the authoress, and prefix, as 
she "does, the titles of those subjects on which her ob- 
servations are made ; doing her the justice to presume 
that her quotations are fairly taken from Mr. Lancas- 
ter's book. 

1. Mr. Lancaster's Preface. — Mrs. Trimmer here 
contends, in opposition to Mr. Lancaster, that ever 
since the establishment of the Protestant Church, the 
education of the poor has been a national concern in 
this country ; and the only argument she produces in 
support of this extravagant assertion, is an appeal to 
the act of uniformity. If there are millions of Eng- 
lishmen who cannot spell their own names, or read a 
ygn-post which bids them turn to the right or left, is 
"t any answer to this deplorable ignorance to say, 
Jhere is an act of Parliament for public instruction ? — 
ro show the very line and chapter where the King, 
Lords, and Commons, in Parliament assembled, or- 
iained the universality of reading and writing, when, 
centuries afterwards, the ploughman is no more capa- 
ble of the one or the other than the beast which he 
drives ? In point of fact, there is no Protestant coun- 
try in the world where the education of the jjoor has 
*>een so grossly and infamously neglected as in Eng- 
land. Mr. Lancaster has the high merit of catling the 
public attention to this evil, and of calling it hi the 
$est way, by new and active remedies ; and this un- 
*andid and feeble lady, instead of using the influence 
she has obtained over the anility of these realms, to 
•oin that useful remonstrance which Mr. Lancaster has 
begun, pretends to deny that the evil exists ; and when 
V'ou ask where are the schools, rods, pedagogues, 
primers, histories of Jack the Giant-killer, and all the 
usual apparatus for education, the only things he can 
produce is the act of uniformity and common prayer. 

2. The Principles on which Mr. Lancaster's institu- 
tion is conducted. — ' Happily for mankind,' says Mr. 
Lancaster, ' it is possible to combine precept and 

1>raetice together in the education of youth : that pub- 
ic spirit, or general opinion, which gives such strength 
to vice, may be rendered serviceable to the cause of 
virtue ; and in thus directing it, the whole secret, the 
beauty, and simplicity of national education consists. 
Suppose, for instance, it be required to train a youth 
to strict veracity. He has learned to read at school : 
he there reads the declaration of the Divine will re- 
specting liars: he is there informed of the pernicious 
effects that practice produces on society at large ; and 
he is enjoined, for the fear of God, for the approbation 
of his friends, and for the good of his school-fellows, 
never to tell an untruth. This is a most excellent pre- 
cept ; but let it be taught, and yet, if the contrary 
practice be treated with indifference by parents, 
teachers, or associates, it will either weaken or de- 
stroy all the good that can be derived from it : But if 
the parents or teachers tenderly nip the rising shoots 



is unfounded. Undoubtedly the fear- of God ought to 
be the paramount principle from the very beginning of 
life, if it were possible to make it so ; but it is a feel- 
ing which can only be built up by degrees. The awe 
and respect which a child entertains for its parent and 
instructor, is the first scaffolding upon which the sa 
cred edifice of religion is reared. A child begins to 
pray, to act, and to abstain, not to please God, but to 
please the parent, who tells him that such is the will 
of God. The religious principle gams ground from the 
power of association and the improvement of reason ; 
but without the fear of man, — the desire of pleasing, 
and the dread of offending those with whom he lives,— 
it would be extremely difficult, if not impossible, to 
cherish it at all in the minds of the children. If you 
tell (says Mr. Lancaster) a child not to swear, be- 
cause it is forbidden by God, and he finds everybody 
whom he lives with addicted to that vice, the mere 
precept will soon be obliterated ; which would acquire 
its just influence if aided by the effect of example. — 
Mr. Lancaster does not say that the fear of man ever 
ought to be a stronger motive than the fear of God, or 
that, in a thoroughly formed character, it ever is : he 
merely says, that the fear of man may be made the 
most powerful mean to raise up the fear of God ; and 
nothing, in our opinion, can be more plain, more sen- 
sible, or better expressed, than his opinions upon these 
subjects. In corroboration of this sentiment, Mr. Lan- 
caster tells the folio whig story : — 

1 A benevolent friend of mine,' says he, who resides at a 
village near London, "where he has a school of the class 
called Sunday Schools, recommended several lads to me for 
education. He is a pious man, and these children had the 
advantage of good j>recepts under his instruction in an em- 
inent degree, but had reduced them to very little practice. 
As they came to my school from some distance, they were 
permitted to bring- their dinners ; and, in the interval be- 
tween morning and afternoon school hours, spent their time 
with a number of lads under similar circumstances in a play- 
ground adjoining the school-room. In this play-ground the 
boys usually enjoy an hour's recreation ; tops, balls, races, 
or what best suits their inclination or the season of the 
year ; but with this charge, "Let all be kept in innocence." 
These lads thought themselves very happy at play with 
their new associates ; but on a sudden they were seized and 
overcome by numbers, were brought into school just as 
people in the .street would seize a pick-pocket, and bring 
him to the police office. Happening at that time to be 
within, I inquired, "Well, boys, what is all this bustle 
about r" — " Why, sir," was the general reply, " these lads 
have been swearing." This was'announced with as much 
emphasis and solemnity as a judge would use in passing 
sentence upon a criminal. The culprits were, as may be 
supposed, in much terror. After the examination of wit- 
nesses and proof of the facts, they received admonition as 
to the offence ; and, on promise of better behaviour, were 
dismissed. No more was ever heard of their swearing ; yet 
it was observable, tnat they were better acquainted with 
the theory of Christianity, and could give a more rational 
answer to questions from the scripture, than several of the 
boys who had thus treated them, on comparison, as consta- 
bles would do a thief. I call this,' adds Mr. Lancaster, 
1 practical religious instruction, and could, if needful, give 
many such anecdotes.' — (p. 26, 27.) 

All that Mrs. Trimmer has to observe against this 
very striking illustration of Mr. Lancaster's doctrine, 
is, that the monitors behaved to the swearers in a very 
rude and unchristianlike manner. She begins with be- 
ing cruel, arid ends with being silly. Her first obser- 
vation is calculated to raise the posse comitatvs against 
Mr. Lancaster, to get him stoned for impiety ; and 
then, when he produces the most forcible example of 
the effect of opinion to encourage religious precept, 
she says such a method of preventing swearing is too 
rude for the gospel. True, modest, unobtrusive reli- 
gion — charitable, forgiving, indulgent Christianity, is 
the greatest ornament and the greatest blessing that 
ciu dwell in the mind of man. But if there is one 
character more base, more infamous, and more shock- 
ing than another, it is him who, for tbe sake of some 



TRIMMER AND LANCASTER. 



23 



paltry distinction in the world, is ever ready to accuse 
conspicuous persons of irreligion — to turn common in- 
former for the church — and to convert the most beau- 
tiful feelings of the human heart to the destruction of 
the good and great, by fixing upon talents the indeli- 
ble stigma of irreligion. It matters not how trifling 
and insignificant? the accuser ; cry out that the church 
is in danger, and your object is accomplished ; lurk in 
the walk of hypocrisy, to accuse your enemy of the 
crime of Atheism, and his ruin is quite certain ; ac- 
quitted or condemned, is the same thing ; it is only 
sufficient that he be accused, in order that his destruc- 
tion be accomplished. If we could satisfy ourselves 
that such were the real views of Mrs. Trimmer, and 
that she were capable of such baseness, we would 
have drawn blood from her at every line, and left her 
in a state of martyrdom more piteous than that of St. 
Uba. Let her attribute the milk and mildness she 
meets with in this review of her book, to the convic- 
tion we entertain, that she knew no better — that she 
really did understand Mr. Lancaster as she pretends to 
understand him — and that if she had been aware of 
the extent of the mischief she Avas doing, she would 
have tossed the manuscript spelling book hi which she 
was engaged into the fire, rather than have done it. — 
As a proof that we are in earnest in speaking of Mrs. 
Trimmer's simplicity, we must state the objection she 
makes to one of Mr. Lancaster's punishments. — 
' When I meet,' says Mr. Lancaster, with a slovenly 
boy, I put a label upon his breast, I walk him round 
the school with a tin or paper crown upon his head.' 
' Surely,' says Mrs. Trimmer, (in reply to this,) l sure- 
ly it should be remembered, that the Saviour of the 
world was crowned with thorns, in derision, and that 
this is the reason why crowning is an improper punish- 
ment for a slovenly boy. 7 !!! 

Rewards and Punishments. — Mrs. Trimmer objects 
to the fear of ridicule being made an instrument of 
education, because it may be hereafter employed to 
shame a boy out of his religion. She might, for the 
same reason, object to the cultivation of the reason- 
ing faculty, because a boy may hereafter be reasoned 
out of his religion : she surely does not mean to say 
that she would make boys insensible to ridicule, the 
fear of which is one curb upon the follies and eccen- 
tricities of human nature. Such an object it would be 
impossible to effect, even if it were useful : Put an 
hundred boys together, and the fear of being laughed 
at will always be a strong influencing mo Live with 
every individual among them. If a master can turn 
this principle to his own use, and get boys to laugh at 
vice instead of the old plan of laughing at virtue, is he 
not doing a very new, a very difficult, and a very lau- 
dable thing ? 

When Mr. Lancaster finds a little boy with a very 
dirty face, he sends for a little girl, and makes her 
wash off the dirt before the whole school : and she is 
directed to accompany her ablutions with a gentle 
box of the ear. To us, this punishment appears well 
adapted to the offence ; and in this, and in most other 
instances of Mr. Lancaster's interference, in scholas- 
tic discipline, we are struck with his good sense, and 
delighted that arrangements apparently so trivial, 
really so important, should have fallen under the at- 
tention of so ingenious and so original a man. Mrs. 
Trimmer objects to this practice, that it destroys 
temale modesty, and inculcates in that sex, an habit 
of giving boxes on the ear. 

' When a boy gets into a singing tone in reading,' says 
Mr. Lancaster, < the best mode of cure that I have hitherto 
found effectual is by the force of ridicule. — Decorate the 
offender with matches, ballads, (dying speeches if needful ;) 
and in this garb send him round the school, with some hoys 
before him crying matches, &c, exactly imitating the dismal 
tones with which such things are hawked about London 
street-, as will readily recur "to the reader's memory. I be- 
lieve many boys behave rudely to Jews more on account 
of the manner in which they cry " old clothes," than be- 
cause they are Jews. I have always found excellent effects 
from treating boys, who sing or tone in their reading, in the 
manner described. It is sure to turn the laugh of the whole 
school upon the delinquent ; it provokes risibility, in spite 
of every endeavour to check it, .in all but the offender. I have 
seldom known a boy thus punished once, for whom it was 



needful a second time. It is also very seldom that a boy 
deserves both a log and a shackle at the same time. Most 
boys are wise enough, when under one punishment, not to 
transgress immediately, lest it should be doubled.' — (p, 47, 
48.) 

This punishment is objected to on the part of Mrs 
Trimmer, because it inculcates a dislike to Jews, and 
an indifference to dying speeches ! Toys, she says, 
given as rewards, are worldly things ; children are to 
be taught that there are eternal rewards in store for 
them. It is very dangerous to give prints as rewards, 
because prints may hereafter be the vehicle of inde- 
cent ideas. It is, above all things, perilous to create 
an orcjer of merit in the borough school, because if 
gives the boys an idea of the origin of nobility, 
' especially in times (we use Mrs. Trimmer's own 
words) which furnish instances of the extinction of a 
race of ancient nobility, in a neighbouring nation, and 
the elevation of some of the lowest people to the 
highest stations. Boys accustomed to consider themselves 
the nobles of the school, may in their future lives, form a 
conceit of their own merits {unless they have very sound 
principles), aspire to be nobles of the land, and to take 
place of the hereditary nobility.' 

We think these extracts will sufficiently satisfy 
every reader of common sense, of the merits of this 
publication. For our part, when we saw these ragged 
and interesting little nobles, shining in their tin stars, 
we only thought it probable that the spirit of emula- 
tion would make them better ushers, tradesmen, and 
mechanics. We did, in truth, imagine we had ob- 
served, in some of their faces, a bold project for pro- 
curing better breeches for keeping out the blast of 
heaven, which howled through those garments in 
every direction, and of aspiring hereafter to greater 
strength of seam, and more perfect continuity of cloth 
But for the safety of the titled orders we had no fear; 
nor did we once dream that the black rod which whipt 
these dirty little -dukes, would one day be borne be 
fore them as the emblem of legislative dignity, and 
the sign of noble blood. 

Order. — The order Mr. Lancaster has displayed in 
the school is quite astonishing. Every boy seems to 
be the cog of a wheel — the whole school a perfect ma- 
chine. This is so far from being a burden or con- 
straint to the boys, that Mr. Lancaster has made it 
quite pleasant to them, by giving to it the air of mili- 
tary arrangement ; not foreseeing, as Mrs. Trimmer 
foresees, that, in times of public dangers, this plan fur- 
nishes the disaffected with the immediate means of 
raising an army ; for what have they to do but to send 
for all the children educated by Mr. Lancaster, from 
the different corners of the kingdom into which they 
are dispersed, to beg it as a particular favour of them 
to fall into the same order as they adopted in the 
spelling class twenty-five years ago ; and the rest is all 
matter of course — 

Jamque faces, et Saxa volant. 

The main object, however, for which this book is 
written, is to prove that the church establishment is 
in danger, from the increase of Mr. Lancaster's insti- 
tutions. Mr. Lancaster is, as we have before obsrerved, 
a Quaker. As a Quaker, he says, I cannot teach your 
creeds ; but I pledge myself not to teach my own. I 
pledge myself (and if I deceive you, desert me, and 
give me up) to confine myself to those points of Chris- 
tianity in which all Christians agree. To which Mrs. 
Trimmer replies, that, in the first place, he cannot do 
this ; and, in the next place, if he did do it, it would 
not be enough. But why, we would ask, cannot Mr. 
Lancaster effect his first object ? The practical and 
the feeling parts of religion are much more likely to 
attract the attention and provoke the questions of chil- 
dren, than its speculative doctrines. A child is not 
very likely to put any questions at all to a catechising 
master, and still less likely to lead him into subtle and 
profound disquisition. It appears to us not only prac- 
ticable, but very easy, to confine the religious instruc- 
tion of the poor, in the first years of life, to those gen- 
eral feelings and principles which are suitable to the 
established church, and to every sect; afterwards, tho 



24 



WORKS OF THE REV. SIDNEY SMITH. 



discriminating tenets of each subdivision of Chris- 
tians may be fixed upon this general basis. To say 
this is not enough, that a child should be made an An- 
tisocinian, or an Antipelagian, in his tenderest years, 
may be very just ; but what prevents you from mak- 
ing him so ? Mr. Lancaster, purposely and intention- 
ally, to allay all jealousy, leaves him in a state as well 
adapted for one creed as another. Begin ; make your 
pupil a firm advocate for the peculiar doctrines of the 
English church; dig round about him, on every side, 
a trench that shall guard him from every species of 
heresy. In spite of all this clamour you do nothing ; 
you do not stir a single step ; you educate alike the 
swineherd and his hog — and then, when a man of real 
genius and enterprise rises up, and says, Let me dedi- 
cate my life to this object ; I will do" every thing but 
that which must necessarily devolve upon you alone ; 
you refuse to do your little, and compel him, by the 
cry of Infidel and Atheist, to leave you to your an- 
cient repose, and not to drive you, by insidious com- 
parisons, to any system of active utility. We deny, 
again and again, that Mr. Lancaster's instruction is 
any kind of impediment to the propagation of the doc- 
trines of the church ; and if Mr. Lancaster was to per- 
ish with his system to-morrow, these boys would pos- 
itively be taught nothing ; the doctrines which Mrs. 
Trimmer considers to be prohibited would not rush in, 
but there would be an absolute vacuum. We will, 
however, say this in favour of Mrs. Trimmer, that if 
every one who has joined in her clamour, had la- 
bored one-hundredth part as much as she has done in 
the cause of national education, the clamour Avould be 
much more rational, and much more consistent, than 
it now is. By living with a few people as active as 
herself, she is perhaps somehow or another persuaded 
that there is a national education going on in this coun- 
try. But our principal argument is, that Mr. Lancas- 
ter's plan is at least better than the nothing which pre- 
ceded it. The authoress herself seems to be a lady of 
respectable opinions, and very ordinary talents ; de 
fending what is right without judgment, and believing 
what is holy without charity. 



PARNELL AND IRELAND.* (Edinburgh Re- 
view, 1807.) 

Historical Apology for the Irish Catholics. By William Par- 
nell, Esquire. Fitzpatrick, Dublin, 1807. 

If ever a nation exhibited symptoms of downright 
madness, or utter stupidity, we conceive these symp- 
toms may be easily recognized in the conduct of this 
country upon the Catholic question. A man has a 
wound in his great toe, and a violent and perilous 
fever at the same time ; and he refuses to take the 
medicines for the fever, because it will disconcert his 
toe ! The mournful and folly-stricken blockhead for- 
gets that his toe cannot survive him ; — that if he dies, 
there can be no digital life apart from him ; yet he 
lingers and fondles over this last part of his body, 
soothing it madly with little plasters, and anile fo- 
mentations, while the neglected fever rages in his 
entrails, and burns away his whole life. If the com- 
paratively little questions of Establishment arc all 
that this country is capable of discussing or regard- 
ing, for God's sake let us remember, that the foreign 
conquest, which destroys all, destroys this beloved 
toe also. Pass over freedom, industry, and science — 
and look upon this great empire, by which we are 
about to be swallowed up, only as it affects the man- 
ner of collecting tithes, and of reading the liturgy — 
still, if all goes, these must go too ; and even, for 

* I do not retract one syllable (or one iota) of what I have 
said or written upon the Catholic question. What was 
wanted for Ireland was emancipation, time and justice, 
abolition of present wrongs : time for Forgetting past 
wrongs, and that continued and even justice which would 
make such oblivion wise. It is now only difficult to tran- 
quilize Ireland, before emancipation it was impossible. As 
to the danger from Catholic doctrines, I must leave such 
apprehensions to the respectable anility of these realms. I 
will not meddle with it. 



their interests, it is worth while to conciliate Ireland, 
to avert the hostility, and to employ the' strength o 
the Catholic population. We plead the question as 
the sincerest friends to the Establishment ; — as wish- 
ing to it all the prosperity and duration its warmest 
advocates can desire, — but remembering always, what 
these advocates seem to forget, that the Establish- 
ment cannot be threatened by any danger so great as 
the perdition of the kingdom in which it is estab- 
lished. 

We are truly glad to agree so entirely with Mr. 
Parnell upon this great question ; we admire his way 
of thinking ; and most cordially recommend his work 
to the attention of the public. The general conclu- 
sion which he attempts to prove is this ; — that reli- 
gious sentiment, however perverted to bigotry or 
fanaticism, has always a tendency to moderation ; 
that it seldom assumes any great portion of activity 
or enthusiasm, except from novelty of opinion, or from 
opposition, contumely, and persecution, when novelty 
ceases ; that a government has little to fear from any 
religious sect, except while that sect is new. Give a 
government only time, and, provided it has the good 
sense to treat foliy with forbearance, it must idti- 
mately prevail. When, therefore, a sect is found, 
after a lapse of years, to be ill disposed to the govern- 
ment, we may be certain that government has'widen- 
ed its separation by marked distinctions, roused its 
resentment by contumely, or supported its enthusiasm 
by persecution. 

The particular conclusion Mr. Parnell attempts to 
prove is, that the Catholic religion in Ireland had 
sunk into torpor and inactivity, till government roused 
it with the lash : that even then, from the respect and 
attachment, which men are always inclined to show 
towards government, there still remained a large 
body of loyal Catholics ; that these only decreased in 
number from the rapid increase of persecution ; and 
that, after all, the effects which the resentment of the 
Roman Catholics had in creating rebellions had been 
very much exaggerated. 

In support of these two conclusions, Mr. Parnell 
takes a survey of the history of Ireland, from the con- 
quest under Henry, to the rebellion under Charles the 
First, passing very rapidly over the period which pre- 
ceded the Reformation, and dwelling principally 
upon the various rebellions which broke out in Ireland 
between the Reformation and the grand rebellion in 
the reign of Charles the First. The celebrated conquest 
of Ireland by Henry the Second, extended only to a 
very few comities in Leinster ; nine-tenths of the whole 
kingdom were left, as he found them, under the domi- 
nion of their native princes. The influence of example 
was as strong in this, as in most olher instances; 
and great numbers of the English settlers who came 
over under various adventurers, resigned their pre- 
tensions to superior civilization, cast off their lower 
garments, and lapsed into the nudity and barbar- 
ism of the Irish. The limit which divided the pos- 
sessions of the English settler from those of the 
native Irish, was called the pale ; and the expressions 
of inhabitants within pale, and without the j ale, were 
the terms by which the two nations were distinguish- 
ed. It is almost superfluous to state, that the most 
bloody and pernicious warfare was carried on upon 
the borders — sometimes for something — sometimes 
for nothing — most commonly for cows. The Irish, 
over whom the sovereigns of England affected a sort 
of nominal dominion, were entirely governed by their 
own laws ; and so very little connection had they 
\\ it'a the justice of the Invading country, that it was 
as lawful* to kill an Irishman, as it was to kill a 
badger or a fox. The instances are innumerablfij 
where the defendant has pleaded that the deceased 
was an Irishman, and that therefore defendant had a 
right to kill him ; — and upon the proof of Hibcrnicism 
acquittal followed of course. 

When the English army mustered in any great 
strength, the Irish chieftains would do exterior ho- 
mage to the English Crown ; and they very frequent- 
ly, by this artifice, averted from their country the 
miseries of invasion : but they remained completely 
unsubdued, until the rebellion which took place in 



PARNELL AND IRELAND. 



25 



the reign of Queen Elizabeth, of which that politic I 
woman availed herself to the complete subjugation of 
Ireland. Iu speaking of the Irish about the reign of I 
Elizabeth, or James the First, we must not draw our 
comparisons from England, but from New Zealand ; 
they were not civilized men, but savages ; and if we 
reason about their conduct, we must reason of them 
as savages. 

1 After reading every account of Irish history,' (says Mr. 
Parnell,) ' one great perplexity appears to remain : How 
does it happen, that, from the first invasion of the English, 
till the reign of James I., Ireland seems not to have made 
the smallest progress in civilization or wealth ? 

' That it was divided into a number of small principali 
ties, which waged constant war on each other, or that the 
appointment of the chieftains was elective, do not appear 
sufficient reasons, although these are the only ones assigned 
by those who have been at the trouble of considering the 
subject : neither are the confiscations of property quite suf- 
ficient to account for the effect. There have been great 
confiscations in other countries, and still they have flour- 
ished : the petty states of Greece were quite analogous to 
the chiefries (as they were called) in Ireland; and yet 
they seemed to flourish almost in proportion to their dis- 
sensions. Poland felt the bad effects of an elective monar- 
chy more than any other country ; and yet, in point of 
civilization, it maintained a very respectable rank among 
the nations of Europe ; but Ireland never, for an instant, 
made any progress in improvement till the reign of James 

1 It is scarcely credible, that in a climate like that of Ire- 
land, and at a period so far advanced in civilization as the 
end of Elizabeth's reign, the greater part of the natives 
shoull go naked. Yet this is rendered certain by the testi- 
mony of an eye witness, Fynes Moryson. " In the re- 
mote parts," he says, " where the English manners are un- 
known, the very chief of the Irish, as well men as women, 
go naked in the winter time, only having their privy parts 
covered with a rag of linen, and their bodies with a loose 
mantle. This I speak of my own experience , yet remem- 
ber that a Bohemian Baron coming out of Scotland to us 
by the north parts of the wild Irish, told me in great ear- 
nestness, that he, coming to the house of O'Kane, a great 
lord amongst them, was met at the door by sixteen women 
til naked, excepting their loose mantles, whereof eight or 
ten were very fair ; with which strange sight his eyes being 
dazzled, they led him into the house, and then sitting down 
by the fire with crossed legs, like tailors, and so low as 
could not but offend chaste eyes, desired him to sit down 
with them. Soon after, O'Kane, the lord of the country, 
came in all naked, except a loose mantle and shoes, which 
he put off as soon as he came in ; and, entertaining the 
Baron after his best manner in the Latin tongue, desired 
him to put off his apparel, which he thought to be a burden 
to him, and to sit naked. 

< " To conclude, men and women at night going to sleep, 
lye thus naked in a round circle about the fire, with their 
feet towards it. They fold their heads and their upper 
parts in woollen mantles, first steeped in water to keep 
them warm ; for they say, that woollen cloth, wetted, pre- 
serves heat (as linen, wetted, preserves cold,) when the 
smoke of their bodies has warmed the woollen cloth." 

1 The cause of this extreme poverty, and of its long con- 
tinuance, we must conclude, arose from the peculiar laws 
of property, which were in force under the Irish dynasties. 
These laws have been described by most writers as similar 
to the Kentish custom of gavelkind ; and indeed so little 
attention was paid to the subject, that were it not for the 
researches of Sir J. Davis, the knowledge of this singular 
usage would have been entirely lost. 

1 The Brehon law of property, he tells us, was similar to 
the custom (as the English lawyers term it) of hodge-podge. 
When any one of the sept died, his lands did not descend 
to his sons, but were divided among the whole sept : and, 
for this purpose, the chief of the sept made a new division 
of the whole lands belonging to the sept, and gave every 
one his part according to seniority. So that no man had a 
property which could descend to his children ; and even 
during his own life, his possession of any particular spot 
was quite uncertain, being liaole to be constantly shuffled 
and changed by new partitions. The consequence of this 
was that there was not a house of brick or stone, among 
the Irish, down to the reign of Henry VI. ; not even a 
garden or orchard, or well fenced or improved field, neither 
village or town, or in any respect the least provision for 
posterity. This monstrous custom, so opposite to the feel- 
ings of mankind, was probably perpetuated by the policy 
of the chiefs. In the first place, the power of partitioning 
beinglodged in their hands, made them the most absolute 
of tyrants, being the dispensers of the property as well as 
of the liberty of their subjects. In the second place it had 
the appearance of adding to the number of their savage 



armies ; for, where there was no improvement or tillage, 
war was pursued as an occupation. 

' In the early history of Ireland, we find several instances 
of chieftains discountenancing tillage; and so late as Eliza 
beth's reign, Moryson says, that " Sir Neal Garve restrain- 
ed his people from ploughing, that they might assist him to 
do any mischief." ' — (p. 9S — 102.) 

These quotations and observations will enable us to 
state a few plain facts for the recollection of our Eng- 
lish readers. 1st, Ireland was never subdued till the re- 
bellion in the reign of Queen Elizabeth. 2d, for four 
hundred years before that period, the two nations had 
been almost constantly at war ; and in consequence of 
this, a deep and irreconcileable hatred existed between 
,the people within and without the pale. 3d, The Irish, 
at the accession of Queen Elizabeth, were unquestion- 
ably the most barbarous people in Europe. So much 
for what had happened previous to the reign of Queen 
Elizabeth : and let any man, who has the most superfi- 
cial knowledge of human affairs, determine, whether 
national hatred, proceeding from such powerful causes, 
could possibly have been kept under by the defeat of 
one single rebellion ; whether it would not have been 
easy to have foreseen, at that period, that a proud, 
brave, half-savage people, would cherish the memory 
of their wrongs for centuries to come, and break forth 
into arms at every period when they were particularly 
exasperated by oppression, or invited by opportunity. 
If the Protestant religion had spread in Ireland as it 
did in England, and if there never had been any differ- 
ence of faith between the two countries, — can it be be- 
lieved that the Irish, ill-treated, and infamously gov- 
erned as they have been, would never have made any 
efforts to shake off the yoke of England ? Surely there 
are causes enough to account for their impatience of 
that yoke, without endeavouring to inflame the zeal of 
ignorant people against the Catholic religion, and to 
make that mode of faith responsible for all the butche- 
ry which the Irish and English, for these last two cen- 
turies, have exercised upon each other. Every body, 
of course, must admit, that if to the causes of hatred al- 
ready specified, there be added the additional cause of 
religious distinction, this last will give greater force 
(and what is of more consequence to observe, give 
a name) to the whole aggregate motive. But what Mr. 
Parnell contends for, and clearly and decisively proves, 
is, that many of those sanguinary scenes attributed to 
the Catholic religion, are to be partly imputed to causes 
totally disconnected from religion ;' that the unjust in- 
vasion, and the tyrannical, infamous policy of the Eng- 
lish, are to take their full share of blame with the soph- 
isms and plots of Catholic priests. In the reign of 
Henry the Eighth, Mr. Parnell shows, that feudal sub- 
mission was readily paid to him by all the Irish chiefs ; 
that the Reformation was received without the slight- 
est opposition ; and that the troubles which took place 
at that period in Ireland, are to be entirely attributed 
to the ambition and injustice of Henry. In the reign 
of Queen Mary, there was no recrimination upon the 
Protestants ; — a striking proof, that the bigotry of the 
Catholic religion had not, at that period, risen to any 
great height in Ireland. The insurrections of the va- 
rious Irish princes were as numerous, during this 
reign, as they had been in the two preceding reigns — 
a circumstance rather difficult of explanation, if, as 
is commonly believed, the Catholic religion was at 
that period the main spring of men's actions. 

In the reign of Elizabeth, the Catholic in the pale 
regularly fought against the Catholic out of the pale. 
O'Sullivan, a bigoted Papist, reproaches them with 
doing so. Speaking of the reign of James the First, he 
says, l And now the eyes even of the English-Irish' 
(the Catholics of the pale) l were opened ; and they 
cursed their former folly for helping the heretic' The 
English government were so sensible of the loyalty of 
the Irish-English Catholics, that they intrusted them 
with the most confidential services. The Earl of Kil- 
dare was the principal instrument in waging war 
against the chieftams of Leix and Offal. William 
O'Bourge, another Catholic, was created Lord Castle 
Connel for his eminent services ; and MacGully Pa* 
trick, a priest, was the state spy. We presume that 
this wise and manly conduct of Queen Elizabeth was 



26 



WO&KS OF THE REV. SIDNEY SMITH. 



utterly unknown both to the Pastrycook and the Secre- 
tary of State, who have published upon the dangers of 
employing Catholics, even against foreign enemies ; 
and in those publications have said a great deal about 
the "wisdom of our ancestors — the usual topic whene- 
ver the folly of their descendants is to be defended. 
To whatever other of our ancestors they may allude, 
they may spare all compliments to this illustrious 
Princess, who would certainly have kept the worthy 
confectioner to the composition of tarts, and most pro- 
bably furnished him with the productions of the Right 
Honorable Secretary, as the means of conveying those 
juicy delicacies to an hungry and discerning public. 

In the next two reigns, Mr. Parnell shows by what 
injudicious measures of the English government the 
spirit of Catholic opposition was gradually formed ; for 
that it did produce powerful effects at a subsequent 
period, he does not deny ; but contends only (as we 
nave before stated) , that these effects have been much 
overrated, and ascribed solely to the Catholic religion, 
when other causes have at least had an equal agency 
in bringing them about. He concludes with some 
general remarks on the dreadful state of Ireland, and 
the contemptible folly and bigotry of the English ;* — 
remarks full of truth, of good sense, and of political 
courage How melancholy to reflect, that there 
would be still some chance of saving England from the 
general wreck of empires, but that it may not be saved, 
because one politician will lose two thousand a year by 
it, and another three thousand — a third a place in re- 
version, and a fourth a pension for his aunt ! — Alas ! 
these are the powerful causes which have always set- 
tled the destiny of great kingdoms, and which may level 
Old England, with all its boasted freedom, and boasted 
wisdom, to the dust. Nor is it the least singular among 
the political phenomena of the present day, that the 
sole consideration which seems to influence the un- 
bigoted part of the English people, in this great 
question of Ireland, is a regard for the personal feel- 
ings of the Monarch. Nothing is said or thought of 
the enormous risk to which Ireland is exposed, — 
nothing of the gross injustice with which the Catho- 
lics are treated, — nothing of the lucrative apostasy 
of those from whom they experience this treatment ; 
but the only concern by which we all seem agitated 
is, that the King must not be vexed in his old age. 
We have a great respect for the King ; and wish him 
all the happiness compatible with the happiness of 
his people. But these are not times to pay foolish 
compliments to Kings, or the sons of Kings, or to any 
body else : this journal has always preserved its 
character for courage and honesty ; and it shall do so 
to the last. If the people of this country are solely 
occupied in considering what is personally agreeable 
to the King, without considering what is for his perma- 
nent good, and for the safety of his dominions ; if all 
public men, quitting the common vulgar scramble for 
emolument, do not concur in conciliating the people of 
Ireland ; if the unfounded alarms, and the compara- 
tively trifling interests of the clergy, are to supersede 
the great question of freedom or slavery, it does ap- 
pear to us quite impossible that so mean and foolish 
a people can escape that destruction which is ready to 
burst upon them ; — a destruction so imminent, that it 
can only be averted by arming all in our defence who 
would evidently be sharers in our ruin, — and by such 
a change of system as may save us from the hazard of 
being ruined by the ignorance and cowardice of any 
general, by the bigotry or the ambition of any minis- 
ter, or by the well meaning scruples of any human 
being, let his dignity be what it may. These minor 
and domestic dangers we must endeavour firmly auu 
temperately to avert as we best can; but, at all haz- 
ards, we must keep out the destroyer from among us, 
or perish like wise and brave men in the attempt. 

* It would be as well, in future, to say no more of the 
revocation of the edict of Nantz. 



METHODISM. (Edinburgh Review, 1808.) 

Causes of the increase of Methodism and Dissension. By 
Robert Acklem Ingram, B. D. Hatchard. 

This is the production of an honest man, possesses 
of a fair share of .under standing. He cries out lustily, 
(and not before it is time) upon the increase of Metho- 
dism ; proposes various remedies for the diminution 
of this evil ; and speaks his opinions with a freedom 
which does him great credit, and convinces us that he 
is a respectable man. The clergy are accused of not 
exerting themselves. What temporal motive, Mr. 
Ingram asks, have they for exertion ? Would a curate, 
who had served thirty years upon a living in the most 
exemplary manner, secure to himself, by such a con- 
duct, the slightest right or title to promotion in the 
church ? What can you expect of a whole profession, 
in which there is no more connection between merit 
and reward, than between merit and beauty, or merit 
and strength? This is the substance of what Mr. 
Ingram says upon this subject; and he speaks the 
truth. We regret, however, that this gentleman has 
thought fit to use against the dissenters, the exploded 
clamour of Jacobinism ; or that he deems it necessary 
to call into the aid of the Church, the power of into- 
lerant laws, in spite of the odious and impolitic tests 
to which the dissenters are still subjected. We believe 
them to be very good subjects ; and we have no doubt 
but that any further attempt upon their religious 
liberties, without reconciling them to the Church, 
would have a direct tendency to render them disaf- 
fected towards the State. 

Mr. Ingram (whose book, by the by, is very dull 
and tedious) has fallen into the common mistake of 
supposing his readers to be as well acquainted with 
the subject as himself; and has talked a great deal 
about dissenters, without giving us any distinct notion 
of the spirit which pervades these people — the objects 
they have in view — or the degree of talent which is to 
be found among them. To remedy this very capital 
defect, we shall endeavour to set before the eyes of the 
reader a complete section of the tabernacle ; and to 
present him with a near view of those sectaries, who 
are at present at work upon the destruction of the or- 
thodox churches, and are destined hereafter, perhaps, 
to act as conspicuous a part in public affairs, as the 
children of Sion did in the time of Cromwell. 

The sources from which we shall derive our extracts, 
are the Evangelical and Methodistical Magazines for 
the year 1807; works which are said to be circulated 
to the amount of 18,000 or 20,000 each, every month; 
and which contain the sentiments of Arminian and 
Calvinistic Methodists, and of the evangelical clergy- 
men of the Church of England. We shall use the 
term Methodism, to designate these three classes of 
fanatics, not troubling ourselves to point out the finer 
shades, and nicer discriminations of lunacy, but treat- 
ing them all as in one general conspiracy against com- 
mon sense, and rational orthodox Christianity. 

In reading these very curious productions, we seemed 
to be in a new world, and to have got among a set of 
beings, of whose existence we had hardly before enter- 
tained the slightest conception. It has been our good 
fortune to be acquainted with many truly religious 
persons, both in the Presbyterian and Episcopalian 
churches ; and from their manly, rational, and serious 
characters, our conceptions of true practical piety 
have been formed. To these confined habits, and to 
our want of proper introductions among the children 
of light and grace, any degree of surprise is to be at- 
tributed, which may be excited by the publications 
before us ; which, under opposite circumstances, would 
(we doubt not) have proved as great a source of in- 
struction and delight to the Edinburgh reviewers, as 
they are to the most melodious votaries of the taber- 
nacle. 

It is not wantonly, or with the most distant inten- 
tion of trifling upon serious subjects, that we call the 
attention of the public to these sort of publications. 
Their circulation is so enormous and so increasing — 
they contain the opinions, and display the habits of 
so many human beings — that they cannot but be 
objects of curiosity and importance. The common 



METHODISM. 



27 



and the middling classes of people are the purchasers ; 
and the subject is religion — though not that religion 
certainly which is established by law, and encouraged 
by national provision. This may lead to unpleasant 
circumstances, or it may not ; but it carries with it a 
sort of aspect, which ought to insure to it serious 
attention and reflection. 

It is impossible to arrive at any knowledge of a reli- 
gious sect, by merely detailing the settled articles of 
their belief: it may be the fashion of such a sect to 
insist upon some articles very slightly ; to bring for 
ward others prominently ; and to consider some por- 
tion of their formal creed as obsolete. As the know- 
ledge of the jurisprudence of any country can never be 
obtained by the perusal of volumes which contain 
some statutes that are daily enforced, and others that 
have been silently antiquated : in the same manner, 
the practice, the preaching, and the writing of sects, 
are comments absolutely necessary to render the pe- 
rusal of their creed of any degree of utility. 

It is the practice, we believe, with the orthodox, 
both in the Scotch and English churches, to insist very 
rarely, and very discreetly, upon the particular in- 
stances of the interference of Divine Providence. 
They do not pretend that the world is governed only 
by general laws — that a Superintending Mind never 
interferes for particular purposes ; but such purposes 
are represented to be of a nature very awful and 
sublime — when a guilty people are to be destroyed, 
when an oppressed nation is to be lifted up, and some 
remarkable change introduced into the order and 
arrangement of the world. With this kind of theology 
we. can have no quarrel; we bow to its truth; we are 
satisfied, with the moderation which it exhibits ; and 
we have no doubt of the salutary effect which it pro- 
duces upon the human heart. Let us now come to 
those special cases of the interference of Providence 
as they are exhibited in the publications before us. 

An interference with respect to the Rev. James Moody. 

1 Mr. James Moody was descended from pious ancestors, 
who resided at Paisley ; — his heart was devoted to music, 
dancing, and theatrical amusements ; of the latter he was 
so fond that he used to meet with some men of a similar 
cast to rehearse plays, and used to entertain a hope that he 
should make a figure upon the stage. To improve himself 
m music, he would rise very early, even in severely cold 
weather, and practice on the German flute : by his skill in 
music and singing, with his general powers of entertaining, 
he became a desirable companion : he would sometimes 
venture to profane the day of God, by turning it into a 
season of carnal pleasure : "and would join in excursions on 
the water, to various parts of the vicinity of London. But 
the time was approaching, when the Lord, who had designs 
of mercy for him, and for many others by his means, was 
about to stop him in his vain career of sin and folly. There 
were two professing servants in the house where he lived; 
one of these was a porter, who, in brushing his clothes, 
would say, "Master James, this will never do — you must 
be otherwise employed — you must be a minister of the gos- 
pel." This worthy man, earnestly wishing his conversion, put 
into his hands that excellent book which God hath so much 
owned, Allein's Alarm to the Unconverted. 

'About this time it pleased God to visit him with a disorder 
in his eyes, occasioned, as it was thought, *by his sitting up in 
the night to improve himself in drawing. The apprehension 
of losing his sight occasioned many serious reflections; his 
mind was impressed with the importance and necessity of 
seeking the salvation of his soul, and he was induced to attend 
the preaching of the gospel. The first sermon that he heard 
with a desire to profit, was at Spa-fields Chapel ; a place 
where he had formerly frequented, when it was a temple of 
vanity and dissipation. Strong convictions of sin fixed on his 
mind ; and he continued to attend the preached word, parti- 
cularly at Tottenham-court Chapel. Every sermon increased 
his sorrow and grief that he had not earlier sought the Lord. 
It was a considerable time before he found comfort from the 
gospel. He has stood in the free part of the chapel, hearing 
with such emotion, that the tears have flowed from his eyes in 
torrents; and when he has returned home, he has continued a 
great part of the night on his knees, praying over what he had 
taard. 

1 The change effected by the power of the Holy Spirit on 
iis heart now became visible to all. Nor did he halt between 
two opinions, as some persons do ; he became at once a de- 
cided character, and gave up for ever all his vain pursuits and 
amusements ; devoting himself with as much resolution and 
diligence to the service of God, as he had formerly done to 
folly.'— Ev. Mag. p. 194. 



An interference respecting Cards. 



« A clergyman not far distant from the spot on which these 
lines' were written, was spending an evening— not in his 
closet wrestling with his Divine Master for the communica- 
tion of that grace which is so peculiarly necessary for the 
faithful discharge of the ministerial function— not in his 
study searching the sacred oracles of divine truth for ma- 
terials wherewith to prepare for his public exercises and 
feed the flock under his care— not in pastoral visits to that 
flock, to inquire into the state of their souls, and endeavour, 
by his pious and affectionate conversation, to conciliate 
their esteem, and promote their edification, but at the card 
table.'— After stating that when it was his turn to deal, he 
dropped down dead, < It is worthy of remark (says the wri- 
ter,) that within a very few years this was the third character 
in the neighbourhood which had been summoned from the 
card table to the bar of God.' — Ev. Mag. p. 262. 

Interference respecting Swearing — a Bee the instrument* 

* A young man is stung by a bee, upon which he buffets 
the bees with Ms hat, uttering at the same time the most 
dreadful oaths and imprecations. In the midst of his fury, 
one of these little combatants stung him upon the tip of 
that unruly member (his tongue,) which was then employed 
in blaspheming his maker. Thus can the Lord engage one 
of the meanest of his creatures in reproving the bold trans- 
gressor who dares to take his name in vain.' — Ev. Mag. p. 
363. 

Interference with respect to David Wright, who was 
cured of Atheism and Scrofula by one Sermon of Mr. 
Coles. 

This case is too long to quote in the language and 
with the evidences of the writers. The substance of 
of it is what our title implies. — David Wright was a 
man with scrofulous legs and atheistical principles ; — 
being with difficulty persuaded to hear one sermon 
from Mr. Coles, he limped to the church in extreme 
pain, and arrived there after great exertions ; — during 
church time he was entirely converted, walked home 
with the greatest ease, and never after experienced 
the slightest return of scrofula or infidelity. — Ev. Mag. 
p. 444. 

The displeasure of Providence is expressed at Captain 
Scott's going to preach in Mr. Romaine's Chapel. 

The sign of this displeasure is a violent storm of 
thunder and lightening just as he came into town. — 
Ev. Mag. p. 537. 

Interference with respect to an Innkeeper, who was de- 
stroyed for having appointed a cock-fight at the very 
time that the service was beginning at the Methodist 
Chapel. 

'"Nevermind," says the innkeeper, "I'll get a greater con- 
gregation than the Methodist Parson; — we'll have a cock 
fight." But what is man! how insignificant his designs, how 
impotent his strength, how ill-fated his plans, when opposed 
to that Being who is infinite in wisdom, boundless in power, 
terrible in judgment, and who frequently reverses, and sud- 
denly renders abortive, the projects of the wicked! A few 
days after the avowal of his intention, the innkeeper sickened,' 
&c. &c. And then the narrator goes on to state, that his 
corpse was carried by the meeting-house, l on the day, and 
exactly at the time, the deceased had fixed for the cock-fight.' — 
Meth. Mag. p. 125. 

In page 167, Meth. Mag., a father, mother, three 
sons, and a sister, are destroyed by particular inter, 
position. 

In page 222, Meth. Mag., a dancing master is de- 
stroyed for irreligion — another person for swearing 
at a cock-fight — and a third for pretending to be deaf 
and dumb. These are called recent and authentic ac- 
counts of God's avenging providence. 

So much for the miraculous interposition of Provi- 
dence in cases where the Methodists are concerned : 
we shall now proceed to a few specimens of the energy 
of their religious feelings. 

Mr. Roberts's feelings in the month of May. 1793. 

1 But, all this time, my soul was stayed upon God : my de- 
sires increased, and my mind was kept in a sweet praying 
frame, a going out of myself, as it were, and taking shelter in 
him. Every breath I drew, ended in a prayer. I felt 
myself helpless as an infant dependent upon God for all 



28 



WORKS OF THE REV. SIDNEY SMITH. 



things. I was in a constant daily expectation of receiving 
all I wanted; and, on Friday, May 31st, under Mr. Ruther- 
ford's sermon, though .entirely independent of it, (for I 
could not give any account of what he bad been preachin 
about,) I was given to feel that God was waiting to be very 
gracious to me; the spirit of prayer and supplication was 
given me, and such an assurance that I was accepted in the 
Beloved, as I cannot describe, but which I shall never for- 
get.'— Meth. Mag. p. 35. 

Mrs. Elizabeth Price and her Attendants hear sacred 
music on a sudden. 

'A few nights before her death, while some neighbours and 
her husband were sitting up with her, a sudden and joyful 
sound of music was heard by all present, although some of 
them were carnal people; at which time she thought she saw 
her crucified Saviour before her, speaking these words with 
power to her soul, "Thy sins are forgiven thee, and I love 
thee freely." After this she never doubted of her acceptance 
with God; and on Christmas day following was taken to 
celebrate the Redeemer's birth in the Paradise of God. 
Michael Cousin.' — Meth. Mag. p. 137. 

T. L. } a Sailor on board of the Stag Frigate has a special 
revelation from our Saviour. 

'October 26th, being the Lord's day, he had a remaikable 
manifestation of God's love to his soul. That blessed morn- 
ing he was much grieved by hearing the wicked use profane 
language, when Jesus revealed himself to him, and impres- 
sed on his mind those words, « Follow Me." This was a 
precious day to him.' — Meth. Mag. p. 140. 

The manner in which Mr. Thomas Cook was accus- 
tomed to accost S. B. 

« Whenever he met me in the street, his salutation used to 
be, "Have you free and lively intercourse with God to-day? 
Are you giving your whole heart to God?" I have known 
him on such occasions speak in so pertinent a manner, that 
I have been astonished at his knowledge of my state. Meet- 
ing me one morning, he said, "I have been praying for you; 
you have had a sore conflict, though all is well now." At 
another time he asked, "Have you been much exercised 
these few days, for I have been led to pray that you might 
especially have suffering grace." ' — Meth. Mag. p. 247. 

Mr. John Kestin on his death-bed. 

* "Oh, my dear, I am now going to glory, happy, happy, 
happy. I am going to sing praises to God and the Lamb ; I 
am going to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. I think I can see 
my Jesus without a glass between. I can, I feel I can, dis- 
cern, < my title clear to mansions in the skies.' Come, Lord 
Jesus, come ! why are thy chariot- wheels so long- delay- 
ing ?" *—Ev. Mag. p. 124. ' 

The Reverend Mr. Mead's sorrow for his sins. 

JnSS?^ "^ 1 } him U ? t0 tem P° rai 7 desperation ; his in- 
expressible grief poured itself forth in groans: « Oh that I 
had never sinned against God! I have a hell hereupon 
earth, and there is a hell for me in eternity !" One Lord's 
day, very early in the morning, he was awoke by a tem- 
IT} «/ £ Under ,/^ li^tning; and imagining it to be the 
^ f } ■ WOrld ' J" s agonv was S reat > supposing the great 
day of divine wrath was come, and he unprepared? but 
nappy to find it not so.'— Ev. Mag. p. 147. 

Similar case of Mr. John Robinson. 

' A A ^ out two hours before he died, he was in great a«- nv 
of body and mind: it appeared that the enemy was permit 
ted to struggle with him; and being greatly agitated, he cried 
out, « Ye powers of darkness, begone !" This however did 
not last long : "the prey was taken from the mighty, and 
the lawful captive delivered," although he was not permit- 
ted to tell of his deliverance, but lay quite still and com- 
posed.'— Ev. Mag. p. 177. 

The Reverend William Tennant in an heavenly trance. 
'"While I was conversing with my brother," said he, 
« on the state of my soul, and the fears I had entertained 
for my future welfare, I found myself in an instant, in an- 
other state of existence, under the direction of a superior 
being, who ordered me to follow him. I was wafted alon- 
I know not how, till I beheld at a distance an ineffable 
glory, the impression of which on my mind it is impossible 
to communicate to mortal man. I immediately reflected on 
my happy change ; and thought, Well, blessed be God ! I 
am safe at last, notwithstanding all my fears. I saw an in- 
numerable host of happy beings surrounding the inexpressi- 
ble glory, m acts of adoration and joyous worship ; but I 
Old not ee any bodily shape or representation in the glori- 



ous appearance. I heard things unutterable. I heard their 
songs and hallelujahs of thanksgiving and praise, with un- 
speakable rapture. I felt joy unutterable and full of glory. 

I then applied to my conductor, and requested leave to join 

the happy throng." ' — Ev. Mag. p. 251. 

The following we consider to be one of the most 
shocking histories we ever read. God only knows how 
many such scenes take place in the gloomy annals of 
Methodism. 

« A young man, of the name of S C , grandson 

to a late eminent Dissenting minister, and brought up by 

him, came to reside at K g, about the year 1603. He 

attended at the Baptist place of worship, not only on the 
Lord's day, but frequently at the week-day lectures and 
prayer-meetings. He was supposed by some to be seriously 
inclined ; but his opinion of himself was, that he had never 
experienced that divine change, without which no man can 
be saved. 

« However that might be, there is reason to believe he had 
been for some years under powerful convictions of his mis- 
erable condition as a sinner. In June 1806, these convic- 
tions were observed to increase, and that in a more than 
common degree. From that time he went into no company, 
but, when he was not at work, kept in his chamber, where 
he was employed in singing plaintive hymns, and bewail- 
ing his lost and perishing state. 

' He had about him several religious people ; but could 
not be induced to open his mind to them, or to impart to 
any one the cause of his distress. Whether this contributed 
to increase it or not, it did increase, till his health w.as 
greatly affected by it, and he was scarcely able to work at 
his business. 

« While he was at meeting on Lord's day, September 14th, 
he was observed to labour under very great emotion of 
mind, especially when he heard the following words. "Sin 
ner, if you die without an interest in Christ, you will sink 
into the regions of eternal death." 

' On the Saturday evening following, he intimated to the 
mistress of the house where he lodged, that some awful 
judgment was about to come upon him; and as he should 
not be able to be at meeting next day, requested that an at- 
tendant might be procured to stay with him. She replied, 
that she would herself stay at home, and wait upon him ; 
which she did. 

1 On the Lord's day he was in great agony of mind. His 
mother was sent for, and some religious friends visited 
Mm; but all was of no avail. That night was a night 
dreadful beyond conception. The horror which he en- 
dured brought on all the symptoms of raging madness. He 
desired the attendants not to come near him, lest they 
should be burnt. He said that " the bed-curtains were in 
flames, — that he smelt the brimstone, — that devils were 
come to fetch him, — that there was no hope for him, for 
that he had sinned against light and conviction, and that he 
should certainly go to hell." It was with difficulty he could 
be kept in bed. 

1 An apothecary being sent for, as soon as he entered the 
house, and heard his dreadful howlings, he inquired if he 
had not been bitten by a mad dog. His appearance, like- 
wise, seemed to justify such a suspicion, his countenance 
resembling that of a wild beast more than of a man. 

'Though he had no feverish heat, yet his pulse beat above 
150 in a minute. To abate the mania, a quantity of blood 
was taken from him, a blister was applied, his head was 
shaved, cold water was copiously poured over him, and 
fox-glove was administered. By these means his fury was 
abated ; but his mental agony continued, and all the symp 
toms of madness which his bodily strength, thus reduced, 
would allow, till the following Thursday. On that day he 
seemed to have recovered his reason, and to be calm in his 
mind. In the evening he sent for the apothecary ; and 
wished to speak with him by himself. The latter, on his 
coming, desired every one to leave the room, and thus ad- 
dressed him : " C , have you not something on your 

mind?" "Ay," answered he, " that is it!" He then ac- 
knowledged that, early in the month of June, he had gone 
to a fair in the neighbourhood, in company with a number 
of wicked young men : that they drank at a public-house 
together till he was in a measure intoxicated; and that from 
thence they went into other company, where lie was crim- 
inally connected with -a harlot. "I have been a miserable 
creature," continued he, " ever since but during the last 
three days and three nights, I have been in a statn of de- 
speration." He intimated to the apothecary, that he could 
not bear to tell this story to his minister : "But," said be, 
" do you inform him that I shall not die in despair , xor 
light has broken in upon me ; I have been led to the great 
Sacrifice for sin, and I now hope in him for salvation." 

' From this time his mental distress ceased, his counte- 
nance became placid, and his conversation, instead of 
being taken up as before with fearful exclamations con- 
cerning devils and the wrath to come, was now confined 
to the dying love of Jesus ! The apothecary was of oj>i- 



METHODISM. 



29 



nion, that if his strength had not been so much exhausted, 
he would now have been in a state of religious transport. 
His nervous system, however, had received such a shock, 
that his recovery was doubtful ; and it seemed certain, that 
if he did recover, he would sink into a state of idiocy. He 
survived this interview but a few days.' — Ev. Mag. p. 412, 
413. , 

A religious observer stands at a turnpike gate an a 
Sunday, to witness the profane crowd passing by ; he 
sees a man driving very clumsily in a gig ; the expe- 
rience of the driver provokes the following pious obser- 
vations. 

* " What (I said to myself,) if a single outward circum- 
stance should happen ! Should the horse take fright, or 
the wheel on either side get entangled, or the gig upset — in 
either case what can preserve him? And should a morn- 
ing so fair and promising bring on evil before night — 
should death on his pale horse appear — what follows ? My 
mind shuddered at the images I had raised." ' — Ev. Mag. 
p. 558, 559. 

Miss Louisa Cooke's rapturous state. 
1 From this period she lived chiefly in retirement, either 
in reading the sacred volume on her knees, or in pouring 
out her soul in prayer to God. While thus employed, she 
was not unfrequently indulged with visits from her gra- 
cious Lord ; and sometimes she felt herself to be surrounded, 
as it were, by his gracious presence. After her return to 
Bristol, her frame of mind became so heavenly, that she 
seemed often to be dissolved in the love of God her Sa- 
viour.' — Ev. Mag. p. 576, 577. 

Objection to Almanacks. 
' Let those who have been partial to such vain produc- 
tions, only read Isaiah xlvii. 1 3, and Daniel ii. 27 ; and they 
will here see what they are to be accounted of, and in 
what company they are to be found ; and let them learn 
to despise their equivocal and artful insinuations, which 
are too frequently blended with profanity ; for is it not 
profanity in them to attempt to palm their frauds upon 
mankind by scripture quotations, which they seldom fail 
to do, especially Judges v. 20, and Job xxxviii. 31 ? neither 
of which teaches nor warrants any such practice. Had 
Baruch or Deborah consulted the stars - ? No such thing.' 
— Ev, Mag. p. 600. 

This energy of feeling will be found occasionally to 
meddle with, and disturb the ordinary occupations 
and amusements of life, and to raise up little qualms 
of conscience, which, instead of exciting respect, 
border, we fear, somewhat too closely upon the ludi- 
crous. 

A Methodist Footman. 

' A gentleman's servant, who has left a good place be- 
cause he was ordered to deny his master when actually at 
home, wishes something on this subject may be introduced 
into this work, that persons who are in the habit of deny- 
ing themselves in the above manner may be convinced of 
its evil.'— Ev. Mag. p. 72. 

Doubts if it is right to take interest for money. 
1 Usury.— Sir, I beg the favour of you to insert the follow- 
ing case of conscience. I frequently find in scripture, that 
Usury is particularly condemned; and that it is repre- 
sented as the character of a good man, that " he hath not 
given forth upon usury, neither hath taken any increase," 
Ezek. xviii. 8, &c. .1 wish, therefore, to know how such 
passages are to be understood ; and whether the taking of 
interest for money, as is universally practiced among us, 
can be reconciled with the word and will of God? Q,.' — 
Ev. Mag. p. 74. 

Dancing ill suited for a creature on trial for eternity. 

' If dancing be a waste of time ; if the precious hours de- 
voted to it may be better employed ; if it be a species of 
trifling ill suited to a creature on trial for eternity, and 
hastening towards it on the swift wings of time ; if it be 
incompatible with genuine repentance, true faith in Christ, 
supreme love to God, and a state of genuine devotedness 
to him, — then is dancing a practice utterly opposed to the 
whole spirit and temper of Christianity, and subversive of 
the best interests of the rising generation.'— Meth. Mag. p. 
127, 128. 

The Methodists consider themselves as constituting 
a chosen and separate people, living in a land of athe- 
ists and voluptuaries. The expressions by which 
they designate their own sects, are the dear people— 



the elect — the people of God. The rest of mankind 
are carnal people — the people of this world, &c. &c. The 
children of Israel were not more separated, through 
the favour of God, from the Egyptians, than the Me- 
thodists are, in their own estimation, from the rest of 
mankind. We had hitherto supposed that the dis- 
ciples of the Established churches in England and 
Scotland had been Christians ; and that, after bap- 
tism, duly performed by the appointed minister, and 
participation in the customary worship of these two 
churches, Christianity was the religion of which they 
were to be considered as members. We see, how- 
ever, in these publications, men of twenty or thirty 
years of age first called to a knowledge of Christ un- 
der a sermon by the Rev. Mr. Venn, — or first admitted 
into the church of Christ under a sermon by the Rev. Mr. 
Romaine. The apparent admission turns out to have 
been a mere mockery ; and the pseudo-christian to 
have had no religion at all, till the business was really 
and effectually done under these sermons by Mr. Venn 
and Mr. Romaine. » 

An awful and general departure from the Christian 
Faith in the Church of England. 
« A second volume of Mr. Cooper's sermons is before us 
stamped with the same broad seal of truth and excellence 
as the former. Amidst the awful and general departure 
from the faith, as once delivered to the saints, in the Church 
of England, and sealed by the blood of our reformers, it is 
pleasing to observe that there is a remnant, according to 
the election of grace, who continue rising up to testify the 
gospel of the grace *of God, and to call back their fellows 
to the consideration of the great and leading doctrines on 
which the Reformation was built, and theChurch of England 
by law established. The author of these sermons, avoiding 
all matters of more doubtful disputation, avowedly attaches 
himself to the great fundamental truths; and on the two 
substantial pillars, the Jachin and Boaz of the living temple, 
erects his superstructure. 1. Justification by faith, without 
works, free and full, by grace alone, through the redemp- 
tion which is in Jesus Christ, stands at the commencement 
of the first volume ; and on its side rises in the beauty of 
holiness,' Scc.—Ev. Mag. p. 79. 

Mr. Robinson called to the knowledge of Christ under 
Mr. Venn's Sermon. 
' Mr. Robinson was called in early life to the knowledge 
of Christ, under a sermon at St. Dunstan's, by the late Rev. 
Mr. Venn, from Ezek. xxxvi. 25, 26 ; the remembrance ot 
which greatly refreshed his soul upon his death-bed.' — JEr. 
Mag. p. 176. 

Christianity introduced into the Parish of Launton t 
near Bicester, in the year 1807. 
'A very general spirit of inquiry having appeared for some 
time in the village of Launton, near Bicester, some serious 
persons were excited to communicate to them the word of 
life.'— Ev. Mag. p. 380. 

We learn in page 128, Meth. Mag., that twelve 
months had elapsed from the time of Mrs. Cocker's 
joining the people of God, before she obtained a clear 
sense of forgiveness. 

A religious Hoy sets off every week for Margate. 

{ Religious Passengers accommodated. — To the Editor. — Sir, 
it afforded me considerable pleasure to see upon the cover 
of«your Magazine for the present month, an advertisement, 
announcing the establishment of a packet, to sail weekly 
between London and Margate, during the season; which 
appears to have been set on foot for the accommodation of 
religious characters; and in which "no profane conversa- 
tion is to be allowed." 

< To those among the followers of a crucified Redeemer, 
who are in the habit of visiting the Isle of Thanet in the 
summer, and who, for the sea air, or from other circum- 
stances, prefer travelling by water, such a conveyance must 
certainly be a desideratum, especially if they have expe- 
rienced a mortification similar to that of the writer, in the 
course of the last summer, when shut up in a cabin with a 
mixed multitude, who spoke almost all languages but that 
of Canaan. Totally unconnected with the concern, and 
personally a stranger to the worthy owner, I take the liberty 
of recommending this vessel to the notice of my fellow - 
Christians ; persuaded that they will think themselves bound 
to patronize and encourage an undertaking that has the 
honour of the dear Redeemer for its professed object. It 
ought ever to be remembered, that every talent we possess, 
whether large or small, is given us in trust to beJLaid out for 



30 



WORKS OF THE REV. SIDNEY SMITH. 



God; and I have often thought that Christians act incon- 
sistently with tb/ur high profession, when they omit, even 
in their most rummon and trivial expenditures, to give a 
decided prefei ence to the friend of their Lord. I do not, 
however, anucipate any such ground of complaint in this 
instance; but rather believe that the religious world in 
general will cheerfully unite with me, while I most cordially 
wish success to the Princess of Wales Yacht, and pray that 
she may ever sail under the divine protection and blessing; 
that the humble followers of Him who spoke the storm into 
a calm, when crossing the lake of Gennesareth, may often 
feel their hearts glowing with sacred ardour, while in her 
cabins they enjoy sweet communion with their Lord and 
with each other ; and that strangers, who may be provi- 
dentially brought among them, may see so much of the 
beauty and excellency of the religion of Jesus exemplified 
in their conduct and conversation, that they may be con- 
strained to say, "We will go with you, for we perceive that 
God is with you. — Your God shall be our God, and his people 
shall henceforth be our chosen companions and associates." 
I am, Mr. Editor, your obliged friend and sister in the 
gospel, E. T.—'Ev. Mag. p. 268. 

A religious newspaper is announced in the Ev. M. 
for September. — It is said of common newspapers, 
' That they are absorbed in temporal concerns, while 
the consideration of those which are eternal is postponed ; 
the business of this life has superseded the claims of 
immortality ; and the monarchs of the world have 
engrossed an attention which would have been more 
properly devoted to the Saviour of the universe.' It 
is then stated, ' that the columns of this paper ( The 
Instructor, Price 6d.) will be supplied by pious re- 
flections ; suitable comments to improve the dispensa- 
tions of Providence will be introduced ; and the whole 
conducted with an eye to our spiritual, as well as 
temporal welfare. The work will contain the latest 
news up to four o'clock on the day of publication, to- 
gether with the most recent religious occurrences. 
The prices of stock, and correct market-tables, will 
also be accurately detailed.' — Ev. Mag. September Ad- 
vertisement. The Eclectic Review is also understood 
to be carried on upon Methodistical principles. 

Nothing can evince more strongly the influence 
which Methodism now exercises upon common life, 
and the fast hold it has got of the people, than the 
advertisements which are circulated every month in 
these very singular publications. On the cover of a 
single number, for example, we have the following : — 

' Wanted, by Mr. Turner, shoemaker, a steady appren- 
tice; he will have the privilege of attending the ministry 
of the gospel; — a premium expected, p. 3. — Wanted, a 
serious young woman, as servant of all work, 3. — Wanted, 
a man of serious character, who can shave, 3. — Wanted, a 
serious woman to assist in a shop, 3. — A young person in 
the millinery line wishes to be in a serious family, 4. — 
Wants a place, a young man who has brewed in a serious 
family, 4. — Ditto, a young woman of evangelical principles, 
4. — Wanted, an active serious shopman, 5. — To be sold, an 
eligible residence, with sixty acres of land ; gospel preached 
in three places within half a mile, 5. — A single gentleman 
may be accommodated with lodging in a small serious 
family, 5. — To let, a genteel first floor in an airy situation 
near the Tabernacle, 6. — Wanted, a governess, of evan- 
gelical principles and corresponding character, 10.' 

The religious vessel we have before spoken of, is 
thus advertised : — 

<The Princess of Wales Yacht, J. Chapman, W. Bourn, 
master, by divine permission, will leave Ralph's Quay 
every Friday, 11.' &c. &c. — July Ev. Mag. 

After the specimens we have given of these people, 
any thing which is said of their activity can very 
easily be credited. The army and navy appear to be 
particular objects of their attention. 

' British Navy.— It is with peculiar pleasure we insert the 
following extract of a letter from the pious chaplain of a 
man-of-war, to a gentleman at Gosport, intimating the 
power and grace of God manifested towards our brave sea- 
men. « Off Cadiz, Nov. 26, 1806.— My dear friend— A fleet 
for England found us in the night, and is just going away. 
I have only to tell you that the work of God seems to pros- 
per. Many are under convictions ;— some, I trust, are con- 
verted. But my own health is suffering much, nor shall I 
probably be able long to bear it. The ship is like a taber- 
nacle; and really there is much external reformation. 
C»pt. — raises no objection. I have near a hundred 



hearers every night at six o'clock. How unworthy am i '. 
—Pray for us." ' — Ev. Mag, 84. 

The testimony of a profane Officer to the worth of Pious 
Sailors. 

Mr. Editor— In the mouth of two or three witnesses, a 
truth shall be established. I recently met with a pleasing 
confirmation of a narrative, stated some time since in your 
Magazine. I was surprised by a visit from an old acquaint- 
ance of mine the other day, who is now an officer of rank 
in hi* Majesty's navy. In the course of conversation, I 
was shocked at the profane oaths that perpetually inter- 
rupted his sentences ; and took an opportunity to express 
my regret that such language should be so common among 
so valuable a body of men. " Sir," said he, still intersper- 
sing many solemn imprecations' " no officer can live at sea 
without swearing; — not one of my men would mind a word 
without an oath; it is common sea-language. If we were 
not to swear, the rascals would take us for lubbers, stare in 
our faces, and leave us to do our commands ourselves. I 
never knew but one exception ; and that was extraordi- 
nary. I declare, believe me 'tis true (suspecting that I 
might not credit it,) there was a set of fellows called Metho- 
dists, on board the Victory, Lord Nelson's ship, (to be sure 
he was rather a religious man himself!) and those men ne 
ver wanted swearing at. The dogs were the best seamen 
on board. Every man knew his duty, and every man did 
his duty. They used to meet together and sing hymns ; and 
nobody dared molest them. The commander would not 
have suffered it had they attempted it. They were allowed 
a mess by themselves ; and never mixed with the ether 
men. I have often heard them sing away myself ; and 'tis 
true, I assure you, but not one of them was either killed or 
wounded at the battle of Trafalgar, though they did their 
dutv as well as any men. No, not one of the psalm-sine ing 
gentry was even hurt ; and there the fellows are swimming 
away in the Bay of Biscay at this very time, singing like 

the d . They are now under a new commander ; but 

still are allowed the same privileges, and mess by them- 
selves. These were the only fellows that I ever knew to 
do their duty without swearing; and I will do them justice 
to say they do it." J. C— Ev. Mag. p. 119, 120. 

These people are spread over the face of the whole 
earth in the shape of missionaries.— Upon the subject 
of missions we shall say very little or nothing at pre- 
sent, because we reserve it for another article in a 
subsequent Number. But we cannot help remarking 
the magnitude of the collections made in favour of the 
missionaries at the Methodistical chapels, when com- 
pared with the collections for any common object of 
charity in the orthodox churches and chapels. 

* Religious Tract Society.— The most satisfactory Report 
was presented by the Committee ; from which it appeared, 
that since the commencement of the Institution in the year 
1799, upwards of Four -Millions of Religious Tracts have 
been issued under the auspices of the Society ; and that con- 
siderably more than one-fourth of that number have been 
sold during the last year.'— Ev. Mag. p. 284. 

These tracts are dropped in villages by the Metho- 
dists, and thus every chance for conversion afforded 
to the common people. There is a proposal in one 
of the numbers of the volumes before us, that travel- 
lers, for every pound they spend on the road, should 
fling one shilling's worth of these tracts out of the 
chaise windoAv ;— thus taking his pleasures at 5 per 
cent, for the purposes of doing good. 

< Every Christian who expects the protection and bles- 
sing of God, ought to take with him as many shillings' worth, 
at least, of cheap Tracts to throw on the road, and leave at 
inns, as he takes out pounds to expend on himself and fa- 
mily. This is really but a trifling sacrifice. It is a highly 
reasonable one; and one which God will accept.— Ev. 
Mag. p. 405. 

It is part of their policy to have a great change of Ministers. 

< Same day, the Rev. W. Haward, from Hc-xton Academy, 
was ordained over the Independent church at Rendham, 
Suffolk. Mr. Pickles, of Walpole, began with a prayer and 
readin- ; Mr. Price, of Woodbridge. delivered the introduc- 
tory discourse, and asked the questions; Mr. Dennant, of 
Halesworth, offered the ordination prayer ; Mr. Shufflebot- 
tom, of Bungay, gave the charge from Acts xx. 28 ; Mr. Vin- 
cent, of De°al, the general prayer; and Mr Walford of 
Yarmouth, preached to the people from 2 Phil. n. 16. — 

E lh^p g eislptnt'd.-' Hambledon Bucks, Sept. M^EigMea 
months ago this parish was destitute of the gospel : the peo- 
ple have now one of the Rev. G. Collison's students the 
Rev, Mr, Eastmead, settled among them. Mr. English of 



METHODISM 



3] 



Wooburn, aad Mr. Frey, preached on the occasion ; and 
Mr. Jones of London, Mr. Churchill of Henley, Mr. Red- 
ford, of Windsor, and Mr. Barratt,now of Petersfield, pray- 
ed.'— Ev. Mag. p. 533. 

Methodism in his Majesty's ship Tonnant — A Utter from the 
Sail-maker. 
* It is with great satisfaction that I can now inform you 
God has deigned in a yet greater degree, to own the weak 
efforts of his servant to turn many from Satan to himself. 
Many are called here, as is plain to be seen by their pen- 
sive looks and deep sighs. And if they would be obedient 
to the heavenly call instead of grieving the Spirit of grace, 
I dare say we should soon have near half the ship's compa- 
ny brought to God. I doubt not, however, but, as I have 
cast my bread upon the waters, it will be found after many 
days. Our 13 are now increased to upwards of 30. Surely 
the Lord delighteth not in the death of him that dieth.' — 
Meth Mag. p. 188. 

It appears also, from p. 193, Meth. Mag., that the 
same principles prevail on board his Majesty's ship 
Sea-horse, 44 guns. And in one part of Evan. Mag. 
great hopes are entertained of the 25th regiment 
We believe this is the number ; but we quote this fact 
from memory. 

We must remember, in addition to these trifling 
specimens of their active disposition, that the Metho- 
dists have found a powerful party in the House of 
Commons, who by the neutrality which they affect, 
and partly adhere to, are courted both by ministers 
and opposition ; that they have gained complete pos- 
session of the India-House ; and under the pretence, 
or, perhaps with the serious intention of educating 
young people for India, will take care to introduce 
(as much as they dare without provoking attention) 
their own particular tenets. In fact, one thing must 
always be taken for granted respecting these people, 
— that wherever they gain a footing, or whatever be 
the institutions to which they give birth, proselytism 
will be their main object • everything else is a mere 
instrument — this is their principal aim. When every 
proselyte is not only an addition to their temporal 
power, but when the act of conversion which gains a 
vote, saves (as they suppose) a soul from destruction, 
— it is quite needless to state, that every faculty of 
their minds will be dedicated to this most important 
of all temporal and eternal concerns. * 

Their attack upon the Church is not merely confined 
to publications ; it is generally understood that they 
have a very considerable fund for the purchase of liv- 
ings, to which, of course, ministers of their own pro- 
fession are always presented. 

Upon the foregoing facts, and upon the spirit evinced 
by these extracts, we shall make a few comments. 

1. It is obvious, that this description of Christians 
entertain very erroneous and dangerous notions of the 
present judgments of God. A belief, that Providence 
interferes in all the little actions of our lives, refers 
all merit and demerit to bad and good fortune ; and 
causes the successful man to be always considered as 
a good man and the unhappy man as the object of 
divine vengeance. It furnishes ignorant and design- 
ing men with a power which is sure to be abused : — 
the cry of, a judgment, a judgment, it is always easy 
to make, but not easy to resist. It encourages the 
grossest superstitions ; for if the Deity rewards and 
punishes on every slight occasion, it is quite impossi- 
ble, but that such an helpless being as man will set 
himself at work to discover the will of Heaven in the 
appearances of outward nature, to apply all the phe- 
nomena of thunder, lightning, wind, and every strik- 
ing appearance to the regulation of his conduct; as 
the poor Methodist, when he rode into Piccadilly in a 
thunder storm, and imagined that all the uproar of the 
elements was a mere hint to him not to preach at Mr. 
Romaine's chapel. Hence a great deal of error, and 
a great deal of secret misery. This doctrine of a 
theocracy must necessarily place an excessive power 
in the hands of the clergy ; it applies so instantly and 
so tremendously to men's hopes and fears, that it must 
make the priest omnipotent over the people, as it al- 
ways has done where it has been established. It has 
a great tendency to check human exertions, and to 
prevent the employment of those secondary means of 



effecting an object which providence has placed in our 
power. The doctrine of the immediate and perpetual 
interference of Divine Providence, is not true. If two 
men travel the same road, the one to rob, the other to 
relieve a fellow-creature who is starving ; will any 
but the most fanatic contend, that they do not both 
run the same chance of falling over a stone, and break- 
ing their legs? and is it not matter of fact, that the 
robber often returns safe, and the just man sustains 
the injury ? Have not the soundest divines, of both 
churches, always urged this unequal distribution of 
good and evil, in the present state, as one of the 
strongest natural arguments for a future state of retri- 
bution ? Have they not contended, and well and ad- 
mirably contended, that the supposition of such a state 
is absolutely necessary to our notion of the justice of 
God — absolutely necessary to restore order to that 
moral confusion which we all observe and deplore in 
the present world ? The man who places religion upon 
a false basis is the greatest enemy to religion. If vic- 
tory is always to the just and good, how is the fortune 
of impious conquerors to be accounted for ? W T hy do 
they erect dynasties, and found families which last 
for centuries? The reflecting mind whom you have 
instructed in this manner, and for present effect only, 
naturally comes upon you hereafter with difficulties 
of this sort ; he finds he has been deceived ; and you 
will soon discover that, in breeding up a fanatic, you 
have unwittingly laid the foundation for an atheist. 
The honest and orthodox method is to prepare young 
people for the World, as it actually exists ; to tell 
them that they will often find vice perfectly success- 
ful, virtue exposed to a long train of afflictions ; that 
they must bear this patiently, and look to another 
world for its rectification. * 

2. The second doctrine which it is necessary to no- 
tice among the Methodists, is the doctrine of inward 
impulse and emotions, which, it is quite plain, must 
lead, if universally insisted upon, and preached among 
the common people, to every species of folly and 
enormity. When a human being believes that his 
internal feelings are the monitions of God, and that 
these monitions must govern his conduct ; and when a 
great stress is purposely laid upon these inward feel- 
ings in all the discourses from the pulpit ; it is, of 
course, impossible to say to what a pitch of extrava- 
gance mankind may not be carried, under the influence 
of such dangerous doctrines. 

3. The Methodists hate pleasure and amusements ; 
no theatre, no cards, no dancing, no punchinello, no 
dancing dogs, no blind fiddlers; all the amusements 
of the rich and of the poor must disappear, wherever 
these gloomy people get a footing. It is not the abuse 
of pleasure which they attack, but the interspersion 
of pleasure, however much it is guarded by good sense 
and moderation ; it is not only wicked to hear the 
licentious plays of Congreve, but wicked to hear Henry 
the Vth, or the School for Scandal ; it is not only dis- 
sipated to run about to all the parties in London and 
Edinburgh, but dancing is not fit for a being who is 
preparing himself for Eternity. Ennui, wretchedness, 
melancholy, groans and sighs, are the offerings which 
these unhappy men make to a Deity who has covered 
the earth with gay colours, and scented it with rich 
perfumes ; and shown us, by the plan and order of his 
works, that he has given to man something better 
than a bare existence, and scattered over his creation 
a thousand superfluous joys, which are totally unne- 
cessary to the mere support of life. 

4. The Methodists lay very little stress upon prac- 
tical righteousness. They do not say to their people, 
do not be deceitful ; do not be idle ; get rid of your 
bad passions ; or at least (if they do say these things) 
they say them very seldom. Not that they preach 
faith without works ; for if they told the people, that 
they might rob and murder with impunity, the civil 
magistrate must be compelled to interfere with such 
doctrine : but they say a great deal about faith, and 
very little about works. What are commonly called 
the mysterious parts of our religion, are brought into 
the foreground much more than the doctrines which 
lead to practice— and this among the lowest of the 
community. 



32 



WORKS OF THE REV. SIDNEY SMITH. 



The Methodists have hitherto been accused of dis- 
senting from the Church of England. This, as far as 
relates to mere subscription to articles, is not true ; 
but they differ in their choice of the articles upon 
which they dilate and expand, and to which they 
appear to give a preference, from the stress which 
they place upon them. There is nothing heretical in 
saying, that God sometimes intervenes with his special 
providence ; but these people differ from the Establish- 
ed Church, in the degree in which they insist upon 
this doctrine. In the hands of a man of sense and 
education, it is a safe doctrine ; in the management of 
the Methodists, we have seen how ridiculous and de- 
grading it becomes. In the same manner, a clergy- 
man of the Church of England would not do his duty, 
if he did not insist upon the necessity of faith, as well 
as of good works ; but as he believes that it is much 
more easy to give credit to doctrines than to live well, 
he labours most in those points where human nature 
is the most liable to prove defective. Because he does 
so, he is accused of giving up the articles of his faith, 
by men who have their partialities also in doctrine ; 
but parties, not founded upon the same sound discre- 
tion, and knowledge of human nature. 

5. The Methodists are always desirous of making 
men more religious than it is possible, from the con- 
stitution of human nature, to make them. If they 
could succeed as much as they wish to succeed, there 
would at once be an end of delving and spinning, and 
of every exertion of human industry. Men must eat, 
and drink, and work ; and if you wish to fix upon them 
high and elevated notions, as the ordinary furniture of 
their minds, you do these two things ; you drive men 
ef warm temperaments mad, and you introduce in the 

' rest of the world, a low and shocking familiarity with 
words and images, which every real friend to religion 
would wish to keep sacred. The friends of the dear 
Redeemer , who are in the habit of visiting the Isle of 
Thanet — (as in the extract we have quoted) — Is it 
possible that this mixture of the most awful, with the 
most familiar images, so common among Methodists 
now; and with the enthusiasts in the time of Crom- 
well, must not, in the end, divest religion of all the 
deep and solemn impressions which it is calculated to 
produce? In a man of common imagination (as we 
ha ve before observed,) the terror, and the feeling 
which it first excited, must necessarily be soon sepa- 
rated : but, where the fervour of impression is long 
preserved, piety ends in Bedlam. Accordingly, there 
is not a mad-house in England, where a considerable 
part of the patients have not been driven to insanity 
by the extravagance of these people. We cannot 
enter such places without seeing a number of honest 
artisans, covered with blankets, and calling them- 
selves angels and apostles, who, if they had remained 
contented with the instruction of men of learning and 
education, would have been sound masters of their 
own trade, sober Christians, and useful members of 
society. 

6. It is impossible not to observe how directly all 
the doctrine of the Methodists is calculated to gain 
power among the poor and ignorant. To say, that 
the Deity governs this world by general rules, and 
that we must wait for another and a final scene of 
existence, before vice meets with its merited punish- 
ment, and virtue with its merited reward ; to preach 
this up daily, would not add a single votary to the 
Tabernacle, nor sell a Number of the Methodistical 
Magazine : but to publish an account of a man who was 
cured of scrofula by a single sermon — of Providence 
destroying the innkeeper at Garstang for appointing 
a cock-fight near the Tabernacle ; this promptness of 
judgment and immediate execution is so much like 
human justice, and so much better adapted to vulgar 
capacities, that the system is at once admitted as soon 
as any one can be found who is impudent or ignorant 
enough to teach it ; and, being once admitted, it pro- 
duces too strong an effect upon the passions to be 
easily relinquished. The case is the same with the 
doctrine of inward impulse, or, as they term it j ex- 
perience. If you preach up to ploughmen and artisans, 
that every singular feeling which comes across them 
is a visitation of the Divine Spirit, can there be any 



difficulty, under the influence of this nonsense, in 
converting these simple creatures into active and 
mysterious fools, and making them your slaves for 
life ? It is not possible to raise up any dangerous 
enthusiasm, by telling men to be just, and good, and 
charitable ; but keep this part of Christianity out of 
sight, and talk long and enthusiastically before igno- 
rant people, of the mysteries of our religion, and you 
will not fail to attract a crowd of followers: verily 
the Tabernacle loveth not that which is simple, in- 
telligible, andleadeth to good sound practice. 

Having endeavoured to point out the spirit which 
pervades these people, we shall say a few words upon 
the causes, the effects, and the cure of this calamity. 
The fanaticism so prevalent in the present day, is one 
of those evils Irom which society is never wholly ex- 
empt ; but which bursts out at different periods, with 
peculiar violence, and sometimes overwhelms every, 
thing in its course. The last eruption took place 
about a century and a half ago, and destroyed both 
Church and Throne with its tremendous force. Though 
irresistible, it was short ; enthusiasm spent its force ; 
the usual reaction took place ; and England was de- 
luged with ribaldry and indecency, because it had 
been worried with fanatical restrictions. By degrees, 
however, it was found out that orthodoxy and loyalty 
might be secured by other methods than licentious 
conduct and immodest conversation. The public 
morals improved ; and there appeared as much good 
sense and moderation upon the subject of religion as 
ever can be expected from mankind in large masses. 
Still, however, the mischief which the Puritans had 
done was not forgotten ; a general suspicion prevailed 
of the dangers of religious enthusiasm ; and the fa- 
natical preacher wanted his accustomed power among, 
a people recently recovered from a religious war, and 
guarded by songs, proverbs, popular stories, and the 
general tide of humour and opinion, against all excesses 
of that nature. About the middle of the last century, 
however, the character of the genuine fanatic was a 
good deal forgotten, and the memory of the civil wars 
worn away ; the field was clear for extravagance in 
piety ; and causes, which must always produce an 
immense influence upon the mind of man, were left to 
their own unimpeded operations. Religion is so noble 
and powerful a consideration — it is so buoyant and 60 
insubmergfble — that it may be made, by fanatics, 
to carry with it any degree of error and of per- 
ilous absurdity. In this instance Messrs. Whit- 
field and Wesley happened to begin. They were 
men of considerable talents ; they observed the com- 
mon decorums of life ; they did not rim naked into the 
streets, or pretend to the prophetical character ; and 
therefore they wertf not committed to Newgate. 
They preached with great energy to weak people ; 
who first stared — then listened — then believed — then 
felt the inward feeling of grace, and became as foolish 
as their teachers could possibly wish them to be ; in 
short, folly ran its ancient course, and human nature 
evinced itself to be what it has always been under si- 
milar circumstances. The great and permanent cause, 
therefore, of the increase of Methodism, is the cause 
which has given birth to fanaticism in all ages — the 
facility of mingling human errors with the fundamental 
truths of religion. The formerly imperfect residence 
of the clergy may, perhaps, in some trifling degree, 
have aided" this source of Methodism. But unless a 
man of education, and a gentleman, could stoop to 
such disingenuous arts as the Methodist preachers, 
unless he hears heavenly music all of a sudden, and 
enjoys sweet experiences, it is quite impossible that he 
can contend against such artists as these. More ac- 
tive than they are at present the clergy might perhaps 
be : but the calmness and moderation of an Establish- 
ment can never possibly be a match for sectarian ac- 
tivity. If the common people are ennui'd with the 
fine acting of Mrs. Siddons, they go to Sadler's Wells. 
The subject is too serious for ludicrous comparisons : 
but the Tabernacle really is to the Church, what Sad- 
ler's Wells is to the Drama. There popularity is 
gained by vaulting and tumbling— by low arts which 
the regular clergy are not too idle to have recourse 
to, but too dignified ; their institutions are chaste and 



METHODISM. 



33 



severe, they endeavour to do that which upon the 

tohole, and for a great number of years, will be found 

to be the most admirable and the most useful : it is 

no part of their plan to descend to small artifices fori persecution, we condemn and attack,' whenever we ob- 

the sake of present popularity and effect. The re- serve them ; but to the learning, the moderation, and 



clear, if they were done, they would do much good. 
Whatever happens, we are for common sense and or- 
thodoxy. Insolence, servile politics, and the spirit of 



ligion of the common people, under the government of 
the Church, may remain as it is forever ; enthusiasm 
must be progressive, or it will expire. 

It is probable that the dreadful scenes which have 
lately been acted in the world, and the dangers to 
which we are exposed, have increased the numbers 
of the Methodists. To what degree will Method- 
ism extend in this country ? This question is not 
easy to answer. That it has • rapidly increased 
within these few years, we have no manner of 
doubt ; and we confess we cannot see what is like- 
ly to impede its progress. The party which it has 
formed in the Legislature ; and the artful neutral- 
ity with Avhich they give respectability to their small 
number, the talents of some of this party, and the un- 
impeached excellence of their characters, all make it 
probable that fanaticism will increase rather than 
diminish. The Methodists have made an alarming 
inroad into the Church, and they are attacking the 
army and navy. The principality of Wales, and the 
East India Company, they have already acquired. 
All mines and subterraneous places belong to them ; 
they creep into hospitals and small schools, and so 
work their way upwards. It is the custom of the reli- 
gious neutrals to beg all the little livings, particularly 
in the north of England, from the minister for the 
time being ; and from these fixed points they make in- 
cursions upon the happiness and common sense of the 
vicinage. We most sincerely deprecate such an 
event ; but it will excite in us no manner of surprise, 
if a period arrives when the sober and orthodox part 
of the English clergy are completely deserted by the 
middling and lower classes of the community. We 
do not prophesy any such event ; but we contend that 
it is not impossible, hardly improbable. If such, in 
future, should be the situation of this country, it is im- 
possible to say what political animosities may not be 
ingrafted upon this marked and dangerous division of 
' mankind into the godly and ungodly. At all events, 
we are quite sure that happiness will be destroyed, 
reason degraded, sound religion banished from the 
world ; and that when fanaticism becomes" too foolish 
and too prurient to be endured (as is at last sure to be 
the case), it will be succeeded by a long period of the 
grossest immorality and debauchery. 

We are not sure that this evil admits of any cure, 
or of any considerable palliation. We most sincerely 
hope that the government of this country will never 
be guilty of such indiscretion as to tamper with the 
Toleration Act, or to attempt to put down these follies 
by the intervention of the law. If experience has 
taught us anything, it is the absurdity of controlling 
men's notions of eternity by acts of Parliament. 
Something may perhaps be done, in the way of ridi- 
cule, towards turning the popular opinion. It may be 
as well to extend the privileges of the dissenters to 
the members of the Church of England; for as the 
law now stands, any man who dissents from the 
Established Church may open a place of worship where 
he pleases. No orthodox clergyman can do so with- 
out the consent of the parson of the parish, who al- 
ways refuses, because he does not choose to have his 
monopoly disturbed ; and refuses in parishes where 
there are not accommodations for one half of the per- 
sons who wish to frequent the Church of England, 
and in instances where he knows that the chapels 
from which he excludes the established worship, will 
be immediately occupied by sectaries. It may be as 
well to encourage in the early education of the clergy, 
a better and more animated method of preaching ; and 
it may be necessary hereafter, if the evil gets to a 
great height, to relax the articles of the English church, 
and to admit a greater variety of Christians within the 

Eale. The greatest and best of all remedies is per- 
aps the education of the poor ; we are astonished, 
that the Established Church of England is not awake 
to this mean of arresting the progress of Methodism. 
Of course none of these things will be done ; nor is it 

C 



the rational piety of the Establishment, we most ear- 
nestly wish a decided victory over the nonsense, the 
melancholy, and the madness of the Tabernacle.* 
God send that our wishes be not in vain. 



INDIAN MISSIONS. (Edinburgh Review, 1808.) 

Considerations on the Policy of communicating the Know- 
ledge of Christianity to the Natives in India. By a late Re- 
sident in Bengal. London. Hatchard, 1807. 

An Address to the Chairman of the East India Company, oc 
casioned by Mr. Twining's Letter to that Gentleman. By 
the Rev. John Owen. London. Hatchard. 

A Letter to the Chairman of the East India Company on the 
Danger of interfering in the religious Opinions of the Na- 
tives of India. By Thomas Twining. London. Ridge- 
way. 

Vindication of the Hindoos. By a Bengal Officer. London. 
Rodwell. 

Letter to John Scott Waring. London. Hatchard. 
Cunningham's Christianity in India. London. Hatchard. 
Answer to Major Scott Waring. Extracted from the Chris- 
tian Observer. 

Observations on the Present State of the East India Company* 
By Major Scott Waring. Ridgeway. London. 

At two o'clock in the morning, July the 10th, 1806, 
the European barracks, at Vellore, containing then four 
complete companies of the 69th regiment, were sur- 
rounded by two battalions of Sepoys in the Company's 
service, who poured in an heavy fire of musketry, at 
every door and window, upon the soldiers : at the 
same time the European sentries, the soldiers at the 
main-guard, and the sick in the hospital, were put to 
death ; the officers' houses were ransacked, and every 
body found in them murdered. Upon the arrival of 
the 19th Light Dragoons under Colonel Gillespie, the 
Sepoys were immediately attacked ; 600 cut down 
upon the spot ; and 200 taken from their hiding places, 
and shot. There perished, of the four European com- 
panies, about 164, besides officers; and many British 
officers of the native troops were murdered by the in- 
surgents. 

Subsequent to this explosion, there was a mutiny at 
Nundydroog ; and, in one day, 450 Mahomedan Se- 
poys were disarmed, and turned out of the fort, on 
the ground of an intended massacre. It appeared, 
also, from the information of the commanding officer 
at Tritchinopoly, that, at that period, a spirit of dis- 
affection had manifested itself at Bangalore, and other 
places ; and seemed to gain ground in every direction. 
On the 3rd of December, 1806, the government of 
Madras issued the following proclamation : — 

'a PROCLAMATION. 

* The Right Hon. the Governor in Council, having ob- 
served that, in some late instances, an extraordinary de- 
gree of agitation has prevailed among several corps of the 
native army of this coast, it has been his Lordship's partic- 
ular endeavour to ascertain the motives which may have 
led to conduct so different from that which formerly distin- 
guished the native army. From this inquiry, it has appear- 
ed that many persons of evil intention have endeavoured, 
for malicious purposes, to impress upon the native troops a 
belief that it is the wish of the British government to con- 
vert them by forcible means to Christianity ; and his Lord- 
ship in Council has observed with concern, that such mali- 
cious reports have been believed by many of the native 
troops. 

< The Right Hon. the Governor in Council, therefore, 
deems it proper, in tins public manner, to repeat to the na- 



* There is one circumstance to which we have neglected 
to advert in the proper place — the dreadful pillage of the 
earnings of the poor which is made by the Methodists. A 
case is mentioned in one of the numbers of these two ma- 
gazines for 1807, of a poor man with a family, earning only 
twenty-eight shillings a week, who has made two donations 
often guineas each to the missionary fund! 



34 



WORKS OF THE REV. SIDNEY SMLH. 



tive troops his assurance, that the same respect which has 
been invariably shown by the British government for their 
religion and for their customs, will be always continued ; 
and that no interruption will be given to any native, wheth- 
er Hindoo or Mussulman, in the practice of his religious 
ceremonies. 

' His Lordship in Council desires that the native troops 
will not give belief to the idle rumours which are circulated 
by enemies of their happiness, who endeavour, with the ba- 
sest designs, to weaken the confidence of the troops in the 
British government. His Lordship in Council desires that 
the native troops will remember the constant attention and 
humanity which have been shown by the British govern- 
ment, in providing for their comfort, by augmenting the 
pay of the native officers and Sepoys ; by allowing liberal 
pensions to those who have done their duty faithfully ; by 
making ample provision for the families of those who may 
have died in battle ; and by receiving their children into the 
service of the'Honourable Companj r , to be treated with the 
same care and bounty as their fathers had experienced. 

< The Right Hon. the Governor in Council trusts„that the 
native troops, remembering these circumstances, will be 
sensible of the happiness oftheir situation, which is greater 
than what the troops of any other part of the world enjoy ; 
and that they will continue to observe the same good con- 
duct for which they were distinguished in the days of Gen. 
Lawrence, of Sir Eyre Coote, and of other renowned he- 
roes. 

' The native troops must at the same time be sensible, 
that if they should fail in the duties of their allegiance, and 
should show themselves disobedient to their officers, their 
conduct will not fail to receive merited punishment, as the 
British government is not less prepared to punish the guilty, 
than to protect and distinguish those who are deserving of 
its favour. 

• It is directed that this paper be translated with care into 
the Tamul, Telinga, and~Hindoostany languages ; and that 
copies of it be circulated to each native battalion, of which 
the European officers are enjoined and ordered to be care- 
ful in making it known to every native officer and Sepoy 
under his command. 

1 It is also directed, that copies of the paper be circulated 
to all the magistrates and collectors under this government, 
for the purpose of being fully understood in all parts of the 
country. 

1 Published by order of the Bight Hon. the Governor in 
(,-ouncil. 

' G. Buchax, Chief Secretary to Government. 
« Dated in Fort St. George, 3d Dec. 1806.' 

Scott Warings Preface, iii. — v. 

So late as March 1807, three months after the date 
of this proclamation, so universal was the dread of a 
general revolt among the native troops, that the 
British officers attached to the native troops con- 
stantly slept with loaded pistols under their pillows. 

It appears that an attempt had been made by the 
military men at Madras, to change the shape of the Se- 
poy turban into something resembling the helmet of the 
light infantry of Europe, and to prevent the native 
troops from wearing, on their foreheads, the marks cha- 
racteristic of their various castes. The sons of the late 
Tippoo, with many noble Mussulmen deprived of 
office at that time, resided in the fortress of Vellore, 
and in all probability contributed very materially to 
excite, or to inflame those suspicions of designs 
against their religion, which are mentioned in the 
proclamation of the Madras government, and gener- 
ally known to have been a principal cause of the in- 
surrection at Vellore. It was this insurrection which 
first gave birth to the question upon missions to India ; 
and before we deliver any opinion upon the subject 
itself, it will be necessary to state what had been 
done in former periods towards disseminating the 
truths of the gospel in India, and what new exertions 
had been made about the period at which this event 
took place. 

More than a century has elapsed since the first 
Protestant missionaries appeared in India. Two 
young divines, selected by the University of Halle, 
were sent out in this capacity by the King of Den- 
mark, and arrived at the Danish settlement of Tran- 
quebar in 1706. The mission thus begun, has been 
ever since continued, and has been assisted by the 
Society for the promotion of Christian Knowledge 
established in this country. The same Society has, 
for many years, employed German missionaries, of 
the Lutheran persuasion, for propagating the doctrines 
of Christianity among the natives of India. In 1799, 
their number was six ; it is now reduced to five. 



The Scriptures, translated into the Tamulic language 
which is vernacular in the southern parts of the pen 
insula, have, for more than half a century, been print- 
ed at the Tranquebar press, for the use of Danish 
missionaries and their converts. A printing press, 
indeed, was established at that place by the two first 
Danish missionaries ; and, in 1714, the Gospel of St 
Matthew, translated into the dialect of Malabar, was 
printed there. Not a line of the Scriptures, in any of 
the languages current on the coast, had issued from 
the Bengal press on September 13, 1806. 

It does appear, however, about the period of the 
mutiny at Vellore, and a few years previous to it, that 
the number of the hiissionaries on the coast had been 
increased. In 1804, the Missionary Society, a recent 
institution, sent a new mission to the coast of Coro- 
mandel ; from whose papers, we think it right to lay 
before our readers the following extracts.* 

'March 3ist, 1805.— Waited on A. B. He says, Govern- 
ernment seems to be very willing to forward our views. We 
may stay at Madras as long as we please ; and when we in- 
tend to go into the country, on our application to the <rov- 
ernor by letter, ho would issue orders for granting us pass- 
ports, which would supersede the necessity of a public peti- 
tion.— Lord's Day.'— Trans, of Miss. Society, II. p. 365. 

In a letter from Brother Ringletaube to Brothel 
Cran, he thus expresses himself : — 

' The passports Government has promised you are so val- 
uable, that I should not think a journey too troublesome to 
obtain one for myself, if I cculd not get it through your in- 
terference. In hopes that your application will suffice to 
obtain one for me, I enclose you my Gravesend passport, 
that will give you the particulars concerning my person.' - 
Trails, of Miss. Society, II. p. 369. 

They obtain their passports from Government; and 
the plan and objects of their mission are printed, free 
of expense, at the Government press. 



1805, June 27, Dr. 



sent for one of us to cons*. 



with him on particular business. He accordingly went. 
The Doctor told him, that he had read the publications 
which the brethren lately brought from England, and was 
so much delighted with the report of the Directors, that he 
wished 200 or more copies of it were printed, together with 
an introduction, giving an account of the rise and progress 
of the Missionary Society, in order to be distributed in the 
different settlements in India. He offered to print them at 
the Government press free of expense. On his return, we 
consulted with our two brethren on the subject, and resolv- 
ed to accept the Doctor's favour. We have begun to pre- 
pare it for the press.'— Trans, of Miss. Society. II. p. 394. 

In page S9th of the 18th Number, Vol. III., the 
Missionaries write thus to the Society in London, 
about a fortnight before the massacre at Vellore. 

Every encouragement is offered us by the established 
government of the country. Hitherto they have granted 
us every request, whether solicited by ourselves or others. 
Their permission to come to this place ; their allowing us 
an acknowledgment for preaching in the fort, which sanc- 
tions us in our work ; together with the grant which they 
have lately given us to hold a large spot of ground every 
way suited for missionary labours, are objects of the last 
importance, and remove every impediment which might be 
apprehended from this source. We trust not to an arm of 
flesh ; but when we reflect on these things, we cannot but 
behold the loving kindness of the Lord.' 

In a letter of the same date, we learn from Brother 
Ringletaube, the following fact : — 

' The Dewan of Travancore sent me word, that if I de- 
spatched one of our Christians to him, he would give me 
leave to build a church at Magilandy. Accordingly, I shall 
send in a short time. For this important service, our society 
is indebted alone to Colonel , without whose deter- 
mined and fearless interposition, none of their missionaries 
would have been able to set afoot in that country.' 



* There are six societies in England for converting 
Heathens to the Christian religion. 1. Society for Missions 
to Africa and the East; of which Messrs. Wilberforce, 
Grant, Parry, and Thorntons, are the principal encourag- 
ers. 2. Methodist Society for Missions. 3. Anabaptist So- 
ciety for Missions. 4. Missionary Society. 5. Society for 
Promoting Christian Knowledge. 6. Moravian Missions 
They all publish their proceedings. 



INDIAN MISSIONS 



36 



In page 381, Vol. II., Dr. Kerr, one of the chaplains 
on the Madras establishment, baptizes a Mussulman 
who had applied to him for that purpose ; upon the 
first application, it appears that Dr. Kerr hesitated ; 
but upon the Mussulman threatening to rise against 
him on the day of judgment, Dr. Kerr complies. 

It appears that in Tinevelly district, about a year 
before the massacre of Vellore, not only riots, but 
very serious persecutions of the converted natives had 
taken place, from the jealousy evinced by the Hindoos 
and Mussulmen at the progress of the gospel. 

1 "Rev. Sir, —I thought you sufficiently acquainted with 
the late vexations of the Christians in those parts, arising 
from the blind zeal of the Heathen and Mahometans ; the 
latter viewing- with a jealous eye the progress of the gospel, 
and trying to destroy, or at least to clog it, by all the crafty 
means in their power. I therefore did not choose to trouble 
you ; hut as no stop has been put to these grievances, things 
go on from bad to worse, as you will see from what has 
happened at Hickadoe. The Catechist has providentially 
escaped from that outrageous attempt, by the assistance of 
ten or twelve of our Christians, and has made good his 
flight to Palamcotta ; whilst the exasperated mob, coming 
from Padeckcpalloe, hovered round the village, plundering 
the houses of the Christians, and ill-treating their families, 
by kicking, flogging, and other bad usage ; these monsters 
not even" forbearing to attack, strip, rob, and miserably 
beat the Catechist .lesuadian, who, partly from illness and 
partly through fear, had shut himself up in his house. I 
have heard various accounts of this sad event ; but yester- 
day the Catechist himself called on me, and told me the 
ti uth of it. From what he says, it is plain that the Manikar 
of Wayrom (a Black peace-officer of that place) has con- 
Lived the whole affair, with a view to vex the Christians. 
I doubt not that these facts have been reported to the Rev. 
Mr. K. by the country priest ; and if I mention them to you, 
it is with a view to show in what a forlorn state the poor 
Christians hereabouts are, and how desirable a thing it 
would be, if the Rev. Mr. Ringletaube were to come hither 
as soon as possible ; then tranquillity would be restored, 
and future molestations prevented. I request you to com- 
municate this letter to him with my compliments. I am, 
sir, &c, Manapaar, June 8, 1S05." 

* This letter left a deep impression on my mind, especi- 
•ally when I received a fuller account of the troubles of the 

Christians. By the Black underlings of the Collectors, they 
are frequently driven from their homes, put in the stocks, 
and exposed for a fortnight together to the heat of the 
rasing sun, and the chilling dews of the night, all because 
there is no European missionary to bring their complaints 
to the ear of Government, who, I am happy to add, have 
never been deficient in their duty of procuring redress, 
where the Christians have had to complain of real injuries. 
One of the most trying cases, mentioned in a postscript of 
the above letter, is'that of Christians being flogged till they 
consent to hold the torches to the Heathen idols. The 
letter says, "the Catechist of Collesigrapatuam has in- 
formed me, that the above Manikar has forced a Christian, 
of the Villally caste, who attends at our church, to sweep 
the temple of the idol. A severe flogging was given on this 
occasion."— From such facts, the postscript continues, 
" You may guess at the deplorable situation of our fellow- 
oelievers, aslong as every Manikar thinks he has a right to 
do them what violence he pleases." 

< It must be observed, to the glory of that Saviour who is 
strong in weakness, that many of the Neophytes in that 
district have withstood all these fiery trials with firmness. 
Many also, it is to be lamented, have fallen off in the evil 
day, and at least so far yielded to the importunity of their 
persecutors, as asain to daub then faces with paint and 
ashes, after the manner of the Heathen. How great this 
falling off has been I am not yet able to judge. But I am 
happy to add, that the Board of Revenue has issued the 
strictest orders against all unprovoked persecution.'— 
Trans, of Miss. Society, II. 431—433. 

The following quotations evince how far from indif- 
ferent the natives are to the progress of the Christian 
religion in the East. 

* 1805. Oct. 10. — A respectable Brahmin in the Com- 
pany's employ called on us. We endeavoured to point out 
to him the important object of our coming to India, and 
mentioned some of the great and glorious truths of the gos- 
t-el, which we wished to impart in the native language.— 
ke seemed much hurt, and told us the Gentoo religion was 
of a divine origin as well as the Christian ;— that heaven 
was like a palace which had many doors, at which 
people may enter ;— that variety is pleasing to God, &c— 
and a number of other arguments which we hear every 
day. On taking leave, he said, " the Company has got the 
country, (for the English are very clever,) and, perhaps, 



they may succeed in depriving' the Brahmins of their power, 
and let you have it." 

' November 16th. —Received a letter from the Rev. Dr. 
Taylor ; we are happy to find he is safely arrived at Cal- 
cutta, and that our Baptist brethren are labouring with in- 
creasing success. The natives around us are astonished to 
hear this news. It is bad news to the Brahmins, who seem 
unable to account for it ; they say the world is going to 
ruin.' — Trans, of Miss. Society, II. 442 and 446. 

'While living in the town, our house was watched by 
the natives from morning to night, to see if any person 
came to converse about religion. This prevented many 
from coming, who have been \ery desirous of hearing oj 
the good way.' — Trans, of Miss. Society, No. 18, p. !-'7. 

1 If Heathen, of great influence and connections, o 
rains, were inclined to join the Christian church, it 
probably cause commotions and even rebelli.. 
prevent them from it, or to endanger their life. In fo 
years, we had some instances of this kind at Tranquebar . 
where they were protected by the assistance of govei : 
If such instances should happen now in our pi< 
we don't know what the consequences would be.,'— 2 
of Miss. Society, II. 185. 

This last extract is contained in a letter from 
nish Missionaries at Tranquebar to the Directors of 
the Missionary Society at London. 

It is hardly fair to contend, after these extracts, 
that no symptoms of jealousy upon the subject of re- 
ligion had. been evinced on the coast, except in the 
case of the insurrection at Vellore ; or that no greater 
activity than common had prevailed among the mis- 
sionaries. We are very far, however, from attributing 
that insurrection exclusively, or even principally, to 
any apprehensions from the zeal of the missionaries. 
The rumour of that zeal might probably have more 
readily disposed the minds of the troops for the cor- 
rupt influence exercised upon them ; but we have no 
doubt that the massacre was principally owing to an 
adroit use made by the sons of Tippoo, and the high 
Mussulmen living in the fortress, of the abominable 
military foppery of our own people. 

After this short sketch of what has been lately pass- 
ing on the coast, we shall attempt to give a similar 
account of missionary proceedings in Bengal ; and it 
appears to us, it will be more satisfactory to do so as 
much as possible in the words of the missionaries 
themselves. In our extracts from their publications, 
we shall endeavour to show the character and style of 
the men employed in these missions, the extent of 
their success, or rather of their failure, and the gene- 
rarimpression made upon the people by their efforts 
for the dissemination of the gospel. 

It will be necessary to premise, that the missions 
in Bengal, of which the public have heard so much of 
late years, are the missions of Anabaptist dissenter?, 
whose peculiar and distinguishing tenet it is, to bap- 
tize the members of their church by plunging them 
into the water when they are grown up, instead of 
sprinkling them with water when they are young. 
Among the subscribers to this society, we perceive the 
respectable name of the Deputy Chairman of the East 
India Company, who, in the common routine of office, 
will succeed to the Chair of that Company at the ensu- 
ing election. The Chairman and Deputy Chairman of 
the East India Company, are also both of them trus- 
tees to another religious society for missions to Africa 
and the East. 

The first Number of the Anabaptist Missions informs 
us that the origin of the Society will be found in the 
workings of Brother Carey's mind, whose heart appears 
to have been set upon the conversion of the Heathen in 
1786, before he came to reside at Moulton. (No. I. p. 1.) 
These workings produced a sermon at Northampton, 
and the sermon a subscription to convert 420 millions 
of Pagans. Of the subscription, we have the following 
account : " Information is come from Brother Carey, 
that a gentleman from Northumberland had promised 
to send him 201. for the Society, and to subscribe four 
guineas annually. 

' At this meeting at Northampton two other friends sub- 
scribed, and paid two guineas a-piece, two more one guinea 
each, and another half a guinea, making six guineas and & 
half in all. And such members as were present of the first 
subscribers, paid their subscriptions into the hands of the 
treasurer; who proposed to put the sum now received into 



36 



WORKS OF THE REV. SIDNEY SMITH. 



the hands of a banker, who will pay interest for the same.' 
—Baft. Miss. Soc. No I. p. 5. 

In their first proceedings they are a good deal 
guided by Brother Thomas, who has been in Bengal 
before, and who lays before the Society an history of 
his life and adventures, from which we make the fol- 
lowing extract : 

' On my arrival in Calcutta, I sought for religious people, 
but found none. At last, how was I rejoiced to hear that a 
very religious man was coming to dine with me at a house 
in Calcutta ; a man who would not omit his closet hours, of 
a morning or evening, at sea or on land, for all the world. 
I concealed my impatience as well as I could, till the joyful 
moment came : and a moment it was, for I soon heard Mm 
take the Lord's name in vain, and it was like a cold dagger, 
with which I received repeated stabs in the course of half 
an hour's conversation : and he was ready to kick me when 
I spoke of some things commonly believed by other hypo- 
crites, concerning our Lord Jesus Christ ; and with fury put 
an end to our conversation, by saying I was a mad enthusi- 
ast, to suppose that Jesus Christ had anything to do in the 
creation of the world, who was born only seventeen hun- 
dred years ago. When I returned, he went home in the 
same ship, and I found him a strict observer of devotional 
hours, but an enemy to all religion, and horribly loose, vain, 
and intemperate in his life and conversation. 

After this I advertised for a Christian; and that I may not 
be misunderstood, I shall subjoin a copy of the advertise- 
ment, from the Indian Gazette of November 1, 1783, which 
now lies before me.' — Bapt. Miss. Soc. No I. p. 14, 15. 

Brother Thomas relates the Conversion of an Hindoo on 
the Malabar Coast to the Society. 

1 A certain man, on the Malabar coast, had inquired of va- 
rious devotees and priests, how he might make atonement 
for his sins ; and at last he was directed to drive iron spikes, 
sufficiently blunted, through his sandals, and on these spikes 
he was to place his naked feet, and walk (if I mistake not) 
250 coss, that is about 480 miles. If, through loss of blood, 
or weakness of body, he was obliged to halt, he might wait 
for healing and strength. He undertook the journey ; and 
while he halted under a large shady tree where the gospel 
was sometimes preached, one of the missionaries came, and 
preached in his hearing from these words, The blood of Je- 
sus Christ cleanseth from all sin. While he was preaching, 
the man rose up, threw off his torturing sandals, and cried 
out aloud, " This is what I want! " '—Bapt. Miss. Soc. No. I. 
p. 29. 

On June 13, 1793, the missionaries set sail, carrying 
with them letters to three supposed converts of Bro- 
ther Thomas, Parbotee, Ram Ram Boshoo and Mohun 
Chund. Upon their arrival in India, they found, to 
their inexpressible mortification, that Ram Ram had 
relapsed into Paganism: and we shall present our 
readers with a picture of the present and Avorldly 
misery to which an Hindoo is subjected, who becomes 
a convert to the Christian religion. Every body knows 
that the population of Hindostan is divided into 
castes, or classes of persons ; and that when a man 
loses his caste, he is shunned by his wife, children, 
friends and relations ; that it is considered an abomi- 
nation to lodge or eat with him ; and that he is a wan- 
derer and an outcast upon the earth. Caste can be 
lost by a variety of means, and the Protestant mis- 
sionaries have always made the loss of it a previous 
requisite to admission into the Christian church. 

< On our arrival at Calcutta, we found poor Ram Boshoo 
Waiting for us : hut to our great grief, he had been bowing 
down to idols again. When Mr. T. left India, he went from 
place to place ; but, forsaken by the Hindoos, and neglect- 
ed by the Europeans, he was seized with a flux and fever. 
In this state, he says, " I had nothing to support me or my 
family ; a relation offered to save me from perishing for 
want of necessaries, on condition of my bowing down to the 
idol ; I knew that the Roman Catholic Christians worship- 
ped idols ; I thought they might be commanded to honour 
images in some part of the Bible which I had not seen ; I 
hesitated, and complied ; but I love Christianity still." ' — 
Bapt. Miss. Soc. Vol. I. p. 64, 65. 

' Jan. 8, 1794. We thought to write you long before this, 
but our hearts have been burthened with cares and sorrows. 
It was very afflicting to hear of Ram Boshoo's great perse- 
cution and fall. Deserted by Englishmen, and persecuted 
by his own countrymen, he was nigh unto death. The na- 
tives gathered in bodies, and threw dust in the air as he 
passed along the streets in Calcutta. At last one of his rel- 
atives offered him an asylum on condition of his bowing 
down to their idols,'— Ibid, p, 78. 



Brother Caiey's Piety at Sea. 

' Brother Carey, while very sea-sick, and leaning over 
the ship to relieve his stomach from that very oppressive 
complaint, said his mind was even then filled with conso- 
lation in contemplating the wonderful goodness of God.' — 
Ibid. p. 76. 

Extract from Brother Carey's and Brother Thomas's 
Journals, at sea and by land. 

1793. June 16. Lord's Day. A little recovered from my 
sickness ; met for prayer and exhortation in my cabin ; had 
a dispute with a French deist.'— Ibid. p. 158. 

' 30. Lord' Day. A pleasant and profitable day : 

our congregation composed of ten persons.' — Ibid. p. 159. 

' July 7. Another pleasant and profitable Lord's Day ; 
our congregation increased with one. Had much sweet en 
joyment with God.' — Ibid. 

' 1794. Jan. 26. Lord's Day. Found much pleasure in read 
ing Edwards' Sermon on the Justice of God in the damnation 
of Sinners.' — Hid. p. 165. 

* April 6. Had some sweetness to-day, especially in read 
ing Edwards' Sermon.' — Ibid. p. 171. 

' June 8. This evening reached Bowlea, where we lay to 
for the Sabbath. Felt thankful that God had preserved us, 
and wondered at his regard for so mean a creature. 1 was 
unable to wrestle with God in prayer for many of my dear 
friends in England.'— Ibid. p. 179. 

' 16. This day I preached twice atMalda, where 

Mr. Thomas met me. Had. much enjoyment; and though 
our congregation did not exceed sixteen, yet the pleasure I 
felt in having my tongue once more set at liberty, I can 
hardly describe. Was enabled to be faithful, and* felt a 
sweet affection for immortal souls. — Ibid. p. 180. 

I 1796. Feb. 6. I am now in my study ; and oh, it is a 
sweet place, because of the presence of God with the vilest 
of men. It is at the top of the house ; I have but one win- 
dow in it.' — Ibid. p. 295. 

' The work to which God has set his hand will infallibly 
prosper. Christ has begun to bombard this strong and an- 
cient fortress, and will assuredly carry it.' — Bapt. Miss Vol. 
I. p. 328. 

' More missionaries I think absolutely nccetsary to the sup- 
port of the interest. Should any natives join us, they would 
become outcast immediately, and must be consequently sup- 
ported by us. The missionaries on the coast are to this day 
obliged to provide for those who join them, as I learn from 
a letter sent to Brother Thomas by a son of one of the mis- 
sionaries.' — Ibid. p. 334, 

In the last extract our readers will perceive a new 
difficulty attendant upon the progress of Chistianity in 
the East. The convert must not only be subjected to 
degradation, but his degradation is so complete, and 
his means of providing for himself so entirely destroyed, 
that he must be fed by his instructor. The slightest 
success in Hindostan would eat up the revenues of 
the East India Company. 

Three years after their arrival, these zealous and 
most active missionaries give the following account of 
success. 

« I bless God, our prospect is considerably brightened up, 
and our hopes are more enlarged than at any period since 
the commencement of the mission, owing to very pleasing 
appearances of the gospel having been made effectual to 
four poor labouring Mussulmen, who have been setting 
their faces towards Zion ever since the month of August 
last. I hope their baptism will not be much longer deferred; 
and that might encourage Mohun Chund, Parbotte, and 
Cassi Naut (who last year^appeared to set out in the ways of 
God), to declare for the Lord Jesus Christ, by an open pro- 
fession of their faith in him. Seven of the natives, we hope, 
are indeed converted.' — Bapt. Miss. Vol. I. p. 345, 346. 

Effects of preaching to an Hindoo Congregation. 

I I then told them, that if they could not tell me, I would 
tell them ; and that God, who had permitted the Hindoos t<v 
sink into a sea of darkness, had at length commiserated 
them ; and sent me and my colleagues to preach life to 
them. 1 then told them of Christ, his death, his person, his 
love, his being the surety of sinners, his power to save, &c. 
and exhorted them earnestly and affectionately to come to 
him. Effects were various ; one man came before I had 
well done, and wanted to sell stockings to me.'— Bapt. Miss. 
Vol. I. p. 357. 

Extracts from Journals. 

« After worship, I received notice that the printing-press 
was just arrived at the Ghat from Calcutta. Retired and 
thanked God for furnishing us with a press.'— Ibid. p. 469. 



INDIAN MISSIONS 



37 



Success in the Sixth Year. 
' We iament that several who did run well are now hin- 
dered. We have faint hopes of a few, and pretty strong 
hopes of one or two ; but if I say more, it must be either a 
dull recital of our journeying to one place or another to 
preach the gospel, or something else relating to ourselves, 
of which I ought to be the last to speak.' — Ibid. p. 488. 

Extracts prom Mr. Ward's Journal, a new Ana- 
baptist Missionary sent out in 1799. * • 

Mr. Ward admires the Captain. 
' Several of our friends who have been sick begin to look 
up. This evening we had a most precious hour at prayer. 
Captain Wickes read from the 12th verse of the 33d of Ex- 
odus, and then joined in prayer. Our hearts were all 
warmed. We shook hands with our dear Captain, and, in 
design, clasped him to our bosoms.' — Ibid. Vol. II. p. 2. 

Mr. Ward is frightened by a Privateer. 
* June 11. Held our conference this evening. A vessel 
is still pursuing us, which the Captain believes to be a 
Frenchman. I feel some alarm : considerable alarm. Oh 
Lord, be thou our defender ! the vessel seems to gain upon 
us. (Quarter past eleven at night.) There is no doubt of 
the vessel being a French privateer : when we changed our 
tack, she changed hers. We have, since dark, changed into 
our old course, so that possibly we shall lose her. Brethren 
G. and B. have engaged in prayer : we have read Luther's 
psalm, and our minds are pretty well composed. Our guns 
are all loaded, and the Captain seems very low. All hands 
are at the guns, and the matches are lighted. I go to the 
end'of the ship. I can just see the vessel, though it is very 
foggy. A ball whizzes over my head, and makes me trem- 
ble. I go down, and go to prayer with our friends.' — Ibid. 
p. 3, 4. 

Mr. Ward feels a regard for the Sailoj-s. 
' July 12. I never felt so much for any men as for our 
sailors ; a tenderness which could weep over them. Oh, 
Jesus ! let thy blood cover some of them ! A sweet prayer 
meeting. Verily God is here.'' — Ibid. p. 7. 

Mr. Ward sees an American vessel, and longs to preach 
to the Sailors. 
'Sept. 27. An American vessel is along-side, and the 
captain is speaking to their captain through his trumpet. 
How pleasant to talk to a friend ! I have been looking at 
them through the glass ; the sailors sit in a group, and are 
making their observations upon us. I long to go and 
preach to them.' — Ibid. p. 11. 

Feelings of the Natives upon hearing their Religion 
attacked. 

' 1800. Feb. 25. Brother C. had some conversation with 
one of the Mussulmen, who asked, upon his denying the 
divine mission of Mahommed, what was to become of Mus- 
sulmen and Hindoos ! Brother C. expressed his fears that 
they would all be lost The man seemed as if he would 
have torn him to pieces.' — Ibid. p. 51. 

'Mar. 30. The people seem quite anxious to get the 
hymns which we gave away. The Brahmins are rather un- 
easy. The Governor advised his Brahmins to send their 
children to learn English. They replied, that we seemed 
to take pains to make the natives Christians ; and they were 
afraid that their children, being of tender age, would make 
them a more easy conquest.' — Ibid. p. 158. 

' April 27. Lord's Dav. One Brahmin said, he had no 
occasion for a hymn, for they were all over the country. 
He could go into any house and read one.' — Ibid. p. 61. 

' May 9. Brother Fountain was this evening at Budda- 
barry. At the close, the Brahmins having collected a num- 
ber of boys, they set up a great shout, and followed the 
brethren out f o the village wit J i noise and shoutings.' — 
Ibid. 

' May 16. Brother Carey and I went to Buddabarry this 
evening. No sooner had we begun, than a Brahmin went 
round to all the rest that were present, and endeavoured to 
pull them away.' — Bapt. Miss. Vol. II. p. 62. 

« 30. This evening at Buddabarry, a man men- 
tioned in my journal of March 14th, insulted Brother Carey. 
He asked why we came ; and said, if we could employ the 
natives as carpenters, blacksmiths, &c. it would be very 
well; but that they did not want our holiness. Inexact 
conformity with this sentiment, our Brahmin told Brother 
Thomas when here, that he did not want the favour of 
God.'— Ibid, p. 63. 

'.June 22. Lord's Day. A Brahmin has been several 
times to disturb the children, and to curse Jesus Christ ! 
Another Brahmin complained to Brother Carey that, by our 
school and printing, we were now teaching the gospel to 
their children from their infancy.' — Ibid. p. 65, 



' June 29. Lord's Day. This evening a Brahmin went 
round amongst the people who were collected to hear 
Brother Carey, to persuade them not to accept of our 
papers. Thus " darkness struggles with light." '—Ibid. 
p. 66. 

< It was deemed advisable to print 2000 copies of the New 
Testament, and also 500 additional copies of Matthew, for 
immediate distribution ; to which are annexed some of the 
most remarkable prophecies in the Old Testament respect- 
ing Christ. These are now distributing, together with 
copies of several evangelical hymns, and a very earnest 
and pertinent address to the natives, respecting the gospel. 
It was written by Ram Boshoo, and contains a hundred 
lines in Bengalee verse. We hear that these papers are 
read with much attention, and that apprehensions are 
rising in the minds of some of the Brahmins whereunto 
these things may grow.' — Ibid. p. 69. 

' We have printed several small pieces in Bengalee, 
which have had a large circulation.' — Ibid. p. 77. 

Mr. Fountain's gratitude to Hervey. 
' When I was about eighteen or nineteen years of age, 
Hervey's Meditations fell into my hands. Till then I had 
read nothing but my Bible and the prayer-book. This 
ushered me as it were into a new world ! It expanded 
my mind, and excited a thirst after knowledge ; and this 
was not all ; I derived spiritual as well as intellectual ad- 
vantages from it. I shall bless God for this book while I 
live upon earth, and when I get to heaven, I will thank dear 
Hervey himself.' — Bapt. Miss. Vol. II. p. 90. 

Hatred of the Natives to the Gospel. 

'Jan. 27. The inveterate hatred that the Brahmins 
every where show to the gospel, and the very name of 
Jesus, in which they are joined by many lewd fellows of 
the baser sort, requires no common degree of self-posses- 
sion, caution, and prudence. The seeming failure of some 
we hoped well of is a source of considerable anxiety and 
grief.'— Ibid. p. 110. 

'Aug. 31. Lord's Day. We have the honour of printing 
the first book that was ever printed in Bengalee ; and this 
is the first piece in which Brahmins have been opposed, 
perhaps for thousands of years. All their books are filled 
with accounts to establish Brahminism, and raise Brahmins 
to the seat of God. Hence they are believed to be inferior 
gods. All the waters of salvation in the country are sup- 
posed to meet in the foot of a Brahmin. It is reckoned 
they have the keys of heaven and hell, and have power 
over sickness and health, life and death. O pray that Brah- 
minism may come down ! — Ibid. p. 111. 

' Oct. 3. Brother Marshman having directed the children 
in the Bengalee school to write out a piece written by Bro- 
ther Fountain (a kind of catechism), the schoolmaster re- 
ported yesterday that all the boys would leave the school 
rather than write it ; that it was designed to make them lose 
caste, and make them Feringas s that is, persons who have 
descended from those who were formerly converted by the 
papists, and who are to this day held in the greatest con- 
tempt by the Hindoos. From this you may gather how 
much contempt a converted native would meet with.' — Ibid. 
p. 113, 114. 

Oct. 26. Lord's Day. Bharratt told Brother Carey to- 
day what the people talked among themselves — " Former- 
ly," say they, " here were no white people amongst us. 
Now the English have taken the country, and it is getting 
full of whites. Now also the white man's shaster is publish- 
ing. Is it not going to be fulfilled which is written in our 
shasters, that all shall be of one caste ; and wdl not this caste 
be the gospel ?' — Ibid. p. 115. 

' Nov. 7. He also attempted repeatedly to introduce Christ 
and him crucified ; but they would immediately manifest 
the utmost dislike of the very name of him. Nay, in their 
turn they commended Creeshnoo, and invited Brother C. to 
believe in him.' — Ibid. p. 118. 

' Dec. 23. This forenoon Gokool came to tell us that 
Kristno and his whole family were in confinement ! As- 
tonishing news ! It seems the whole neighbourhood, as 
soon as it was noised abroad that these people had lost caste, 
was in an uproar. It is said that two thousand people were 
assembled pouring their anathemas on these new converts.' 
—Bapt. Miss. Vol. II. p. 125. 

* Jan. 12. The Brahmins and the young people show 
every degree of contempt ; and the name of Christ is be- 
come a by-word, like the name methodist in England for- 
merly.' — Ibid. p. 130. 

' Sept. 25. I then took occasion to tell them that the 
Brahmins only wanted their money, and cared nothing 
about their salvation. To this they readily assented.' — 
Ibid. p. 134. # 

' Nov. 23. Lord's Day. Went with Brother Carey to the 
new pagoda, at the upper end of the town. About ten 
Brahmins attended. They behaved in the most scoffing and 
Blasphemous manner, treating the name of Christ with the 
greatest scorn ; nor did they discontinue their ridicule while 



WORKS OF THE REV. SIDNEY SMITH. 



Brother Carey prayed with them. No name amongst men 
seems so offensive to them as that of our adorable Redeem- 
er !' — Hid. p. 138. 

•' Dec. 24. The Governor had the goodness to call on us 
in the course of the day, and desired us to secure the girl, at 
least within our walls, for a few days, as he was persuaded 
the people round the country were so exasperated at 
Kristno's embracing the gospel, that he could not answer 
i'.r their safety. A number of the mob might come from 
twenty miles distant in the night, and murder them all, with- 
out the prepetrators being discovered. He believed, that 
had tney obtained the girl,, they would have murdered her 
before the morning, and thought they had been doing God 
service !' — Ibid. p. 143, 144. 

' Jan. 30. After speaking about ten minutes, a rude fel- 
low began to be very abusive, and, with the help of a few 
boys, raised such a clamour that nothing could be heard, 
-it length, seeing no hope of their becoming quiet, I retired 
to the other part of the town. They followed, hallooing, 
and crying " Hurree boll !" (an exclamation in honour of 
Veeshno.) They at last began to pelt me with stones and 
dirt. One of the men, who knew the house to which Bro- 
ther Carey was gone, advised me to accompany him thither, 
saying, that these people would not hear our words. Going 
with him, I met Brother C. We were not a little pleased 
that the devil had begun to bestir himself, inferring from 
hence that he suspected danger.' — Ibid. p. 148, 149. 

Feelings of an Hindoo Boy upon the eve of Conversion. 

* Nov. IS. One of the boys of the school, called Benjamin, 
is under considerable concern ; indeed there is a general 
stir amongst our children, which affords us great encourage- 
ment. The following are some of the expressions used in 
prayer by poor Benjamin : — 

• « Oh Lord, the day of judgment is coming : the sun, and 
moon, and stars will all fall down. Oh, what shall I do in 
the day of judgment! Thou wilt break me to pieces. 
[literal.] The Lord Jesus Christ was so good as to die for 
us poor souls : Lord, keep us all this day i Oh hell ! gnash- 
ing, and beating, and beating ! One hour weeping, another 
gnashing ! We shall stay there for ever ? I am going to 
heii : I am going to heU ! Lord, give me a new heart ; 
give me a new heart ; and wash away all my sins ! Give 
me a new heart, that I may praise Him, that I may obey 
Him, that I may speak the truth, that I may never do evil 
things ! Oh, I have many times sinned against thee, many 
times broken thy commandments, oh many times; and 
what shall I do in the day. of judgment !" ' — Bavt. Miss. 
Vol. II. p. 162, 163. 



Alarm of the Natives at the preaching of the Gospel. 

' From several parts of Calcutta he hears of people's at- 
tention being excited by reading the papers which we have 
scattered among them. Many begin to wonder that they 
never heard thesethings before, since theEnglish have been 
so long in the country.' — Ibid. p. 223. 

• Many of the natives have expressed their astonishment 
at seeing the converted Hindoos sit and eat with Europe- 
ans. It is what they thought would never come to pass. 
The priests a-re much alarmed for their tottering fabric, and 
rack their inventions to prop it up. They do not like the 
institution of the college in Calcutta, and that their sacred 
shasters should be explored by the unhallowed eyes of Eu- 
ropeans.' — Ibid. p. 233. 

• Indeed, by the distribution of many copies of the Scrip- 
tures, and of some thousands of small tracts, a spirit of in- 
quiry has been excited to a degree unknown at any former 
period.'— Ibid. p. 236. 

'Ashe and Kristno walked through the street, the natives 
cried out, " What will this joiner do ? (meaning Kristno.) 
Will he destroy the caste of us all ? Is this Brahmin going 
to be a Feringa ?" ' — Ibid. p. 245. 

Account of success in 1802. — Tenth year of the Mission. 

• Wherever we have gone we have uniformly found, that 
so long as people did not understand the report of our 
message, they appeared to listen ; but the moment they 
understood something of it, they either became indifferent, 
or began to ridicule. This in general has been our recep- 
tion.'— Bavt Miss. Vol. II. p. 273. 

Hatred of the Natives 

'Sept. 27. This forenoon three of the people arrived from 
Ponchetalokpool, who seemed very happy to see us. They 
inform us that the Brahmins had raised a great persecution 
againsflthem ; and when they set out on their journey 
hither, the mob assembled to hiss them away. After Brother 
Marshman had left that part of the country, they hung 
him in effigy and some of the printed papers which he had 
distributed among them.'— Ibid. p. 314. 



Difficulty which the Mission experiences from not being 
able to get Converts shaved. 
1 Several persons there seemed willing to be baptized : 
but if they should, the village barber, forsooth, will not 
shave them .' When a native loses his caste, or becomes 
unclean, his barber and his priest will not come near him ; 
and as they are accustomed to shave the head nearly all 
over, and cannot well perform this business themselves, 
it becomes a serious inconvenience.' — Ibid. p. 372. 

Hatred of the Natives. 
' Apr. 24. Lord's Day, Brother Chamberlain preached at 
home, and Ward at Calcutta : Brother Carey was amongs 
the brethren, and preached at night. Kristno Prisaud, Ram 
Roteen, and others, were at Buddabatty, where they met 
with violent opposition. They were set upon as Feringas, 
as destroyers of the caste, as having eaten fowls, eggs, &c. 
As they attempted to return, the mob began to beat them, 
putting their hands on the back of their necks, and pushing 
ihem forward; and one man, even a civil officer, grazed 
the point of a spear against the body of Kristno Prisaud. 
When they saw that they could not make our friends angry 
by such treatment, they said, You salla; you will not" be 
angry, will you ? They then insulted them again, threw 
cow-dung mixed in gonga water at them ; talked of making 
them a necklace of old shoes; beat Neeloo with Ram Po- 
teen's shoe, &c. ; and declared that if they ever came again 
they would make an end of them." — Bait. Miss. vol. 1L. p. 
378. 

A Plan for procuring an order from Government to 
shave the Converts. 
• After concluding with prayer, Bhorud Ghose, Sodkur* 
and Torribot Bichess, took me into the field, and told- me 
that their minds were quite decided ; there was no necessity 
for exhorting them. There was only one thing that kept 
them from being baptized in the name of Jesus Christ. — ■ 
Losing caste in a large town like gerampore was a very dif- 
ferent thing from losing caste in their village. If they de- 
clared themselves Christians, the barber of their village 
would no longer shave them; and, without shaving their 
heads and their beards, they could not live. If an order 
could be obtained from the magistrate of the district for 
the barber to shave Christians as well as others, they would 
be immediately baptized.'— Ibid. p. 397. 

We meet in these proceedings with the account of 
two Hindoos who had set up as gods, Bulol and Ram 
Bass. The missionaries conceiving this schism from 
the religion of the Hindoos to be a very favourable 
opening for them, wait upon the two deities. With 
Dulol, who seems to be a very shrewd fellow, they 
are utterly unsuccessful ; and the following is an ex- 
tract from the account of their conference with Ram 
Dass: 

' After much altercation, I told him he might put the 
matter out of all doubt as to himself: he had only to come 
as a poor, repenting, suppliant sinner, and he would be 
saved, whatever became of others. To this he gave no other 
answer than a smile of contempt. I then asked him in what 
way the sins of these his followers would be removed ; urg- 
ing it as a matter of the last importance, as he knew that 
they were all sinners, and must stand before the righteous 
bar of God ? After much evasion, he replied that he had 
fire in his belly, which would destroy the sins of all his 
followers V— Ba.pt. Miss. Vol. II. p. 401. 

A Brahmin Converted. 

' Dec. 11. Lord's Day. A Brahmin came from Nuddea. 
After talking to him about the gospel, which he said hewas 
very willing to embrace, we sent him to Kristno 's. He ate 
with them without hesitation, but discovered such a thirst 
for Bengalee rum, as gave them a disgust.' 

' Dec. 13. This morning the Brahmin decamped sudden- 
ly.'— Bapt. Miss. Vol. II. p. 424. 

Extent of Printing. 

1 Sept. 12. We are building an addition to our printing 
office, where we employ seventeen printers and five book- 
binders. The Brahmin from near Bootan gives some hope 
that he has received the truth in love.' — Ibid. p. 483. 

1 The news of Jesus Christ, and of the church at Seram- 
pore, seems to have gone much further than I expected: 
it appears to be known to a few in most villages. — Ibid. 
p. 487. 

Hatred to the Gospel. 
' The caste (says Mr. W.) is the great millstone round the 
necks of these people. Roteen wants shaving; but the 



INDIAN MISSIONS. 



barber here will not do it. He is run away lest ne should 
be compelled. He says be will not shave Yesoo Kreest s 
people!'— Ibid. p. 493. 

Success greater by importunity in prayer. 
< With respect to their success, there are several particu- 
lars attending it worthy of notice. One is that .it was pre- 
ceded by a spirit of importunate prayer. The brethren baa 
all along Committed their cause to God : but in the autumn 
of 1S00, they had a special weekly prayer-meeting for a 
blessing on the work of the mission. At these assemblies, 
Mr. Thomas, who was then present on a visit, seems to 
have been more than usually strengthened to wrestle tor a 
blessine; : and writing to a friend in America, he speaks or 
« the holy unction appearing on all the missionaries, espe- 
cially of late ; and of times of refreshing from the presence 
of the Lord, being solemn, frequent, and lasting.' In con- 
necting these things, we cannot but remember, that previ- 
ous to the outpouring of the Spirit in the days of Pentecost, 
the disciples " continued with one accord m prayer and 
supplication." '— Bapt. Miss. Pref. Vol. III. p. vn. 

What this success is, we shall see by the following 
extract : 

' The whole number baptised in Bengal since the year 
1795, is forty-eight. Over many of these we rejoice with 
<reat joy; for others we tremble ; and over others we are 
compelled to weev.'—Bapt, Miss. Vol. III. p. 21, 22- 

Hatred to the Gospel. 
April 2. This morning, several of our chief printing ser- 
vants presented a petition, desiring they might have some 
relief, as they were compelled, in our Bengalee worship, to 
hear so many blasphemies asainst their gods ! Brother Ca- 
rey and I had a strong contention with them in the print- 
ing-office, and invited them to argue the point with Petum- 
ber, as his sermon had given them offence ; but they de- 
clined it; though we told them that they were ten, and he 
only one ; that they were Brahmins, and he was only a 
sooder ! ' — Ibid. p. 36. -"'.■'. 

< The enmity against the gospel and its professors is uni- 
versal. One of our baptised Hindoos wanted to rent a 
house : after sroing out two or three days, and wandering 
all -the town over, he at last persuaded a woman to let him 
have a house: but though she was herself a Fermga, yet 
when she heard that he Avas a Brahmin who had become a 
Christian, she insulted him, and drove him away: so that 
we are indeed made the offscouring of all things.'— Ibid. 
p. 38. 

<I was sitting among our native brethren, at the Benga- 
lee school, hearing them read and explain a portion of the 
word in turn, when an aged, grey-headed Brahmin, well 
dressed, came in ; and standing before me, said, with joined 
hands', and a supplicating tone of voice, "Sahib! I am 
come to ask an alms." Beginning to weep, he repeated 
these words hastily ; "I am come to ask ... an almsV.' — 
He continued standing, with his hands in a supplicating 
posture, weeping. I desired him to say what alms ; and 
told him, that by his looks, it did not seem as if he wanted 
any relief. At length, being pressed, he asked me to give 
him his son, pointing with his hand into the midst of our 
native brethren. I asked which was his son ? He pointed 
to a voung Brahmin, named Soroop ; and setting up a plain- 
tive cry, said, that was his son. We tried to comfort him, 
and at "last prevailed upon him to come and sit down upon 
the veranda. Here he began to weep again ; and said that 
the young man's mother was dying with grief.' — Ibid. p. 43. 

< This evening Buvoo, a brother, who is servant with us, 
ano^Soroop, went to a market in the neighbourhood, where 
thev Avsre discovered to be Yesoo Khreestare Loke (Jesus 
Christ's people). The whole market was all in a hubbub : 
they clapped their hands, and threw dust at them. Buxoo 
was changing a rupee for cowries, when the disturbance 
began ; and in the scuffle, the man ran away with the rupee 
without giving the cowries.' — Ibid. p. 55. 

' Nov. 24. This day Hawnye and Ram Khunt returned 
from their village. They relate that our brother Fotick, 
who lives in the same village, was lately seized by the chief 
Bengalee man there ; dragged from his house ; his face, 
eyes, and ears clogged with cow-dung — his hands tied — and 
in this state confined several hours. They also tore to 
pieces all the papers, and the copy of the Testament, which 
they found in Fotick's house. A relation of these persecu- 
tors being dead, they did not molest Hawnye and Ram 
Khunt ; but the towns-folk would not hear about the gos- 
pel : they only insulted them for becoming Christians.' — 
Ibid. p. 57. 

' Cutwa on the Ganges, Sept. 3, 1804.— This place is about 
seventy mdes from Serampore, by the Hoogley river. 
Here I have procured a spot of ground, perhaps about two 
acres, pleasantly situated by two tanks, and a fine grove 
of mango trees, at a small distance from the town. It was 
with difficulty I procured a spot. I was forced to leave 



one, after I had made a beginning, through the violent op- 
position of the people. Coming to this, opposition ceased; 
and therefore I called it Rehoboth ; for Jehovah hath made 
room for us. Here I have raised a spacious bungalo.' - 
Ibid. p. 59. 

It would perhaps be more prudent to leave the ques- 
tion of sending missionaries to India to the effect of 
these extracts, which appear to us to be quite decisive, 
both as to the danger of insurrection from the prose- 
cution of the scheme, the utter unfitness of the persons 
employed in it, and the complete hopelessness of the 
attempt while pursued under such circumstances as 
now exist. But, as the Evangelical party who have 
got possession of our Eastern empire have brought 
forward a great deal of argument upon the question, 
it may be necessary to make it some sort of reply. 

We admit it to be the general duty of Christian 
people to disseminate their religion among the Pagan 
nations who are subjected to their empire. It is true 
they have not the aid of miracles ; but it is their duty 
to attempt such conversion by the earnest and abun- 
dant employment of the best human means in their 
power. We believe that we are in the possession of a 
revealed religion ; that we are exclusively in posses- 
sion of a revealed religion ; and that the possession 
of that religion can alone confer immortality, and best 
confer present happiness. This religion too, teaches 
us the duties of general benevolence ; and, how, under 
such a system, the conversion of Heathens, can be a 
matter of indifference, we profess not to be able to 
understand. 

So much for the general rule : — now for the excep- 
tions. 

No man (not an Anabaptist) will, we presume, con- 
tend that it is our duty to preach the natives into an 
insurrection, or to lay before them, so fully and em- 
phatically, the scheme of the gospel, as to make them 
rise up in the dead of the night and shoot their instruc- 
tors through the head. If conversion be the greatest 
of all objects, the possession of the country to be con- 
verted is the only mean, in this instance, by which 
that conversion can be accomplished ; for we have no 
right to look for a miraculous conversion of the Hin- 
doos ; and it would be little short of a miracle, it 
General Oudinot was to display the same spirit as the 
serious part of the Directors of the East India Com- 
pany. Even for missionary purposes, therefore, the 
utmost discretion is necessary ; and if we wish to 
teach the natives a better religion, we must take care 
to do it in a manner which will not inspire them with 
a passion for political change, or we shall inevitably 
lose our disciples altogether. To us it appears quite 
clear, from the extracts before us, that neither Hindoo 
nor Mahomedan is at all indifferent to the attacks 
made upon his religion ; the arrogance and the irrita- 
bility of the Mahomedan are universally acknow- 
ledged ; and we put it to our readers, whether the 
Brahmins seem in these extracts to show the smallest 
disposition to behold the encroachments upon their 
religion with passiveness and unconcern. A mission- 
ary who converted only a few of the refuse of society, 
might live for ever in peace in India, and receive his 
salary from his fanatical masters for pompous predic- 
tions of universal conversion, transmitted by the ships 
of the season ; but, if he had any marked success 
among the natives, it could not fail to excite much 
more dangerous specimens of jealousy and discontent 
than those which we have extracted from the Ana- 
baptist Journal. How is it in human nature that a 
Brahmin should be indifferent to encroachments upon 
his religion 1 His reputation, his dignity, and, in a 
great measure, his wealth, depend upon the preserva- 
tion of the present superstitions ; and why is it to be 
supposed that motives which are so powerful with all 
other human beings, are inoperative with him alone ? 
If the Brahmins, however, are disposed to excite a 
rebellion in support of their own influence, no man 
who knows anything of India, can doubt that they 
have it in their power to effect it. 

It is vain to say that these attempts to diffuse Chris- 
tianity do not originate from the government in India . 
The omnipotence of government in the East is well 
known to the natives. If Government does no c pro- 



40 



WORKS OF TH£ REV. SIDNEY SMITH. 



hibit, it tolerates ; if it tolerates the conversion of the 
natives, the suspicion may be easily formed that it 
encourages that conversion. If the Brahmins do not 
believe this themselves, they may easily persuade the 
common people that such is the fact ; nor are there 
wanting, besides the activity of these new missiona- 
ries, many other circumstances to corroborate such a 
rumour. Under the auspices of the College at Fort 
William ; the Scriptures are in a course of translation 
into the languages of almost the whole continent of 
Oriental India, and we perceive, that in aid of this 
object the Bible Society has voted a very magnificent 
, subscription. The three principal chaplains of our 
Indian settlement are (as might be expected) of princi- 
ples exactly corresponding with the enthusiasm of 
their employers at home ; and their zeal upon the 
subject of religion has shone aud burnt with the most 
exemplary fury. These circumstances, if they do 
not really impose upon the minds of the leading na- 
tives, may give them a very powerful handle for mis- 
representing the intentions of government to the lower 
orders. 

We see from the massacre of Vellore, what a pow- 
erful engine attachment to religion may be rendered 
in Hindostan. The rumours might all have been false ; 
but that event shows they were tremendously power- 
ful when excited. The object, therefore, is not only 
not to do anything violent and unjust upon subjects of 
religion, but not to give any stronger colour to jealous 
and disaffected natives for misrepresenting your inten- 
tions. 

All these observations have tenfold force when ap- 
plied to an empire which rests so entirely upon opi- 
nion. If physical force could be called in to stop the 
progress of error, we could afford to be misrepresent- 
ed for a season ; but 30,000 white men, living in the 
midst of 70 million sable subjects, must be always in 
the right, or at least never represented as grossly in 
the wrong. Attention to the prejudices of the subject 
is wise in all governments, but quite indispensable in 
a government constituted as our empire in India is 
constituted ; where an uninterrupted series of dexter- 
ous conduct is not only necessary to our prosperity, 
but to our existence. 

These reasonings are entitled to a little more consi- 
deration, at a period when the French threaten our 
existence in India by open force, and by every species 
of intrigue with the native powers. In all govern- 
ments everything takes its tone from the head ; fana- 
ticism has got into the government at home ; fanati- 
cism will lead to promotion abroad. The civil servant 
in India will not only dare to exercise his own judg- 
ment in checking the indiscretions of ignorant mission- 
aries, but he will strive to recommend himself to his 
holy masters in Leadenhall-street, by imitating Bro- 
ther Cran and Brother Ringletaube, and by every 
species of fanatical excess. Methodism at home is no 
unprofitable game to play. In the East it will soon be 
the infallible road to promotion. This is the great 
evil : if the management was in the hands of men who 
were as discreet and wise in their devotion as they are 
in matters of temporal welfare, the desire of putting an 
end to missions might be premature and indecorous. 
But the misfortune is, the men who wield the instru- 
ment, ought not, in common sense and propriety, to 
be trusted with it for a single instant. Upon this sub- 
ject they are quite insane and ungovernable ; they 
would deliberately, piously, and conscientiously ex- 
pose our whole Eastern empire to destruction, for the 
sake of converting half a dozen Brahmins, who, after 
stuffing themselves with rum and rice, and borrowing 
money from the missionaries, would run away, and 
cover the gospel and its professors with every species 
of ridicule and abuse. 

Upon the whole, it appears to us hardly possible to 
push the business of proselytism in India to any length 
without incurring the utmost risk of losing our em- 
pire. The danger is more tremendous, because it may 
be so sudden ; religious fears are very probable cau- 
ses of disaffection in the troops ; if the troops are 
generally disaffected, our Indian empire may be lost 
to us as suddenly as a frigate or a fort ; and that 



empire is governed by men who, we are very much 
afraid, would feel proud to lose it in such a cause. 

'But I think it my duty to make a solemn appeal to all 
who still retain the fear of God, and who admit that reli- 
gion and the course of conduct which it prescribes are not 
to he banished from the affairs of nations— now when the 
political sky, so long overcast, has become more lowering 
and hlack than ever — whether this is a period for augment- 
ing the weight of our national sins and provocations, by 
an exclusive toleration of idolatry ; a crime which, unless 
the Bible be a forgery, has actually drawn forth the heavi- 
est denunciations of vengeance, and the most fearful in 
flictions of Divine displeasure.'— Considerations, &c. p. 98. 

Can it be credited that this is an extract from a 
pamphlet generally supposed to be written by a noble 
Lord at the Board of Control, from whose official in- 
terference the public might have expected a correc- 
tive to the pious temerity of others ? 

The other leaders of the party, indeed, make at 
present great professions of toleration, and express 
the strongest abhorrence of using violence to the 
natives. This does very well for a beginning, but we 
have little confidence in such declarations. We be- 
lieve their fingers itch to be at the stone and clay 
gods of the Hindoos ; and that, in common with the 
noble Controller, they attribute a great part of. our 
national calamities to these ugly images of deities on 
the other side of the world. We again repeat, that 
upon such subjects, the best and ablest men, if once 
tinged by fanaticism, are not to be trusted for a single 
moment. 

2dly, Another reason for giving up the task of con- 
version, is the want of success. In India, religion 
extends its empire over the minutest actions of life. 
It is not merely a law for moral conduct, and for 
occasional worship, but it dictates to a man his trade, 
his dress, his food, and his whole behaviour. His 
religion also punishes a violation of its exactions, not 
by eternal and future punishments, but by present 
infamy. If an Hindoo is irreligious, or, in other 
words, if he loses his caste, he is deserted by father, 
mother, wife, child, and kindred, and becomes in- 
stantly a solitary wanderer upon the earth : to touch 
him, to receive him, to eat with him, is a pollution 
producing a similar loss of caste ; and the state ot 
such a degraded man is worse than death itself. To 
these evils an Hindoo must expose himself before he 
becomes a Christian ; and this difficulty must a mis- 
sionary overcome before he can expect the smallest 
success — a difficulty which, it is quite clear, they 
themselves, after a short residence in India, consider 
to be insuperable. 

As a proof of the tenacious manner in which the 
Hindoos cling to their religious prejudices, we shall 
state two or three very short anecdotes, to which any 
person who has resided in India might produce many 
parallels. 

' In the year 1766, the late Lord Clive and Mr. Verelst 
employed the whole influence of Government to restore a 
Hindoo to his caste, who had forfeited it, not by any ne- 
glect of his own, but by having been compelled, by a most 
unpardonable act of violence, to swallow a drop of cow 
broth. The Brahmins, from the peculiar circumstances of 
the case, were very anxious to comply with the wishes of 
government; the principal men among them met once at 
Kishnagur, and once at Calcutta; but "after consultations, 
and an examination of their most ancient records, they de- 
clared to Lord Clive, that as there was no precedent to 
justify the act, they found it impossible to restore the unfor- 
tunate man to his caste, and he died soon after of a broken 
heart.' — Scott Waring' s Preface, p. lvi. 

It is the custom of the Hindoos to expose dying 
people upon the banks of the Ganges. There is some- 
thing peculiarly holy in that river ; and it soothes the 
agonies of death to look upon its waters in the last 
moments. A party of English were coming down hi a 
boat, and perceived upon the bank a pious Hindoo, in 
a state of the last imbecility— about to be drowned by 
the rising tide, after the most approved and orthodox 
manner of their religion. They had the curiosity to 
land ; and as they perceived some more signs of life 
than were at first apparent, a young Englishman pour- 
ed down his throat the greatest part of a bottle of la- 



INDIAN MISSIONS. 



41 



vender water, which he happened to have in his pocket. 
The effects of such a stimulus, applied to a stomach 
accustomed to nothing stronger than water, were in- 
stantaneous and powerful. The Hindoo revived suffi- 
ciently to admit of his being conveyed to the boat, was 
carried to Calcutta, and perfectly recovered. He had 
drunk, however, in the company of Europeans — no 
matter whether voluntary or involuntary — the offence 
was committed : he lost caste, was turned away from 
his home, and avoided, of course, by every relation 
and friend. The poor man came before the police, 
making the bitterest complaints upon being restored 
to life ; and for three years the burden of supporting 
him fell upon the mistaken Samaritan who had rescued 
him from death. During that period, scarcely a day 
elapsed in which the degraded resurgent did not ap- 
pear before the European, and curse him with the bit- 
terest curses — as the cause of all his misery and deso- 
lation. At the end of that period he fell ill, and of 
course was not again thwarted in his passion for dy- 
ing. The writer of this article vouches for the truth 
of this anecdote ; and many persons who were at Cal- 
cutta at the time must have a distinct recollection of 
the fact, which excited a great deal of conversation 
and amusement, mingled with compassion. 

It is this institution of castes which has preserved 
India in the same state in which it existed in the days 
of Alexander ; and which would leave it without the 
slightest change in habits and maimers, if we were to 
abandon the country to-morrow. We are astonished 
to observe the late resident in Bengal speaking of the 
fifteen millions of Mahomedans in India as converts 
from the Hindoos ; an opinion, in support of which he 
does not offer the shadow of au argument, except by 
asking, whether the Mahomedans have the Tartar 
face ? and if not, how they can be the descendants of 
the first conquerors of India ? Probably not altoge- 
ther. But does this writer imagine, that the Maho- 
medan empire could exist in Hindostan for 700 years 
Without the intrusion of Persians, Arabians, and every 
species of Mussulman adventurers from every part of 
the East, which had embraced the religion of Maho- 
med ? And let them come from what quarter they 
would, could they ally themselves to Hindoo women 
without producing in their descendants an approxima- 
tion to the Hindoo features ? Dr. Robertson, who has 
investigated this subject with the greatest care, and 
looked into all the authorities, is expressly of an op- 
posite opinion ; and considers the Mussulman inhabi- 
tants of Hindostan to be merely the descendants of 
Mahomedan adventurers, and not converts from the 
Hindoo faith. 

f The armies,' (says Or me) ' which made the first 
conquests for the heads of the respective dynasties, 
or for other invaders, left behind them numbers of 
Mahomedans, who, seduced by a finer climate, and a 
richer country, forgot their own. 

1 The Mahomedan princes of India naturally gave a 
preference to the service of men of their own religion, 
who, from whatever country they came, were of a 
more vigorous constitution than the stoutest of the 
subjected nation. This preference has continually 
encouraged adventurers from Tartary, Persia, and 
Arabia, to seek their fortunes under a government 
from which they were sure of receiving greater en- 
couragement than they could expect at home. From 
these origins, time has formed in India a mighty na- 
tion of near ten millions of Mahomedans.' — Orme's 
Indostan, I. p. 24. 

Precisely similar to this is the opinion of Dr. Ro- 
bertson, Note xl. — Indian Disquisition. 

As to the religion of the Ceylonese, from which the 
Bengal resident would infer the facility of making con- 
verts of the Hindoos, it is to be observed that the re- 
ligion of Boudhou, in ancient times, extended from the 
north of Tartary to Ceylon, from the Indus to Siam, 
and (if Foe and Boudhou are the same persons) over 
China. That of the two religions of Boudhou and 
Brama, the one was the parent of the other, there 
can be very little doubt ; but the comparative anti- 
quity of the two is so very disputed a point, that it is 
quite unfair to state the case of the Ceylonese as an 
nstanee of conversion from the Hindoo religion to 



any other : and even if the religion of Brama is the 
most ancient of the two, it is still to be proved, that 
the Ceylonese professed that religion before they 
changed it for their present faith. In point of fact, 
however, the boasted Christianity of the Ceylonese is 
proved by the testimony of the missionaries them- 
selves, to be little better than nominal. The follow- 
ing extract from one of their own communications 
dated Columbo, 1S05, will set this matter in its true 
light :— 

1 The elders, deacons, and some of the members of the 
Dutch congregation, came to see us, and we paid them a 
visit in return, and made a little inquiry concerning the 
state of the church on this island, which is, in one word, 
miserable ! One hundred thousand of those who are called 
Christians, (because they are baptized) need not go back 
to heathenism, for they never have been any thing else but 
heathens, worshippers of Budda : they have been induced, 
for worldly reasons, to be baptized. O Lord, have mercy 
on the poor inhabitants of this populous island !' — Trans. 
Miss. Soc. II. 265. 

o 

What success the Syrian Christians had in making 
converts ; in what degree they have gained their num- 
bers by victories over the native superstition, or lost 
their original numbers by the idolatrous examples to 
which for so many centuries they have been exposed, 
are points wrapt up in so much obscurity, that no kind 
of inference as to the facility of converting the na- 
tives, can be drawn from them. Their present num- 
ber is supposed to be about 150,000. 

It would be of no use to quote the example of Ja- 
pan and China, even if the progress of the faith in 
these empires had been much greater than it is. We 
do not say it is difficult to convert the Japanese, or the 
Chinese ; but the Hindoos. We are not saying it is 
difficult to convert human creatures ; but difficult to 
convert human creatures with such institutions. To 
mention the example of other nations who have them 
not, is to pass over the material objection, and to an- 
swer others Avhich are merely imaginary, and have 
never been made. 

3dly, The duty of conversion is less plain, and less 
imperious, when conversion exposes the convert to 
great present misery. An African or an Otaheite 
proselyte might not perhaps be less honoured by his 
countrymen if he became a Christian ; an Hindoo is 
instantly subjected to the most perfect degradation. 
A change of faith might increase the immediate hap- 
piness of any other individual ; it annihilates for ever 
all the human comforts which an Hindoo enjoys. The 
eternal happiness which you proffer him, is therefore 
less attractive to him than to any other heathen, from 
the life of misery by which he purchases it. 

Nothing is more precarious than our empire in In- 
dia. Suppose we were to be driven out of it to-morrow, 
and to leave behind us twenty thousand converted 
Hindoos, it is most probable they would relapse into 
heathenism ; but their original station in society could 
not be regained. The duty of making converts, there- 
fore, among such a people, as it arises from the gene- 
ral duty of benevolence, is less strong than it would 
be in many other cases ; because, situated as we are, 
it is quite certain we shall expose them to a great deal 
of misery, and not quite certain we shall do them any 
future good. 

Athly, Conversion is no duty at all, if it merely de- 
stroys the old religion, without really and effectually 
teaching the new one. Brother Ringletaube may 
write home that he makes a Christian, when in reality 
he ought only to state that he has destroyed an Hin- 
doo. Foolish and imperfect as the religion of an Hin- 
doo is, it is at least some restraint upon the intempe- 
ranee of human passions. It is better a Brahmin 
should be respected than that nobody should be re- 
spected. An Hindoo had better believe that a deity 
with an hundred legs and arms, will reward and pu- 
nish him hereafter, than that he is not to be punished 
at all. Now, when you have destroyed the faith of an 
Hindoo, are you quite sure that you will graft upon 
his mind fresh principles of action, and make him any 
thing more than a nominal Christian ? 

You have 30,000 Europeans in India, and sixty mill 
ions of other subjects. If proselytism were to go on as 



42 



WORKS OF THE REV. SIDNEY SMITH. 



rapidly as the most visionary Anabaptist could dream 
or desire, in what manner are these people to be 
taught the genuine truths and practices of Christiani- 
ty ? Where are the clergy to come from? Who is to 
defray the expense of the establishment ? and who 
can foresee the immense and perilous difficulties of 
bending the laws, manners, and institutions of a coun- 
try to the dictates of a new religion ? If it were easy 
to persuade the Hindoos that their own religion was 
folly, it would be infinitely difficult effectually to teach 
them any other. They would tumble their own idols 
into the river, and you would build them no churches ; 
you would destroy all their present motives for doing 
right, and avoidiiig wrong, without being able to fix 
upon their minds the more sublime motives by which 
you profess to be actuated. What a missionary will 
do hereafter with the heart of a convert, is a matter 
of doubt and speculation. He is quite certain, how- 
ever, that he must accustom the man to see himself 
as infamous ; and good principles can hardly be ex- 
posed to a ruder shock. Whoever has seen much of 
Hindoo Christians must have perceived, that the man 
who bears that name is very commonly nothing more 
than a drunken reprobate, who conceives himself at 
liberty to eat and drink any thing he pleases, and an- 
nexes hardly any other meaning to the name of Chris- 
tianity. Such sort of converts may swell the list of 
names, and gratify the puerile pride of a missionary; 
but what real, discreet Christian can wish to see such 
Christianity prevail ? But it Will be urged, if the pre- 
sent converts should become worse Hindoos, and very 
indifferent Christians, still the next generation will do 
better ; and by degrees, and at the expiration of half 
a century, or a century, true Christianity may prevail. 
We may apply to such sort of Jacobin converters what 
Mr. Burke said of the Jacobin politicians in his time : 
' To such men a whole generation of human beings are 
of no more consequence than a frog in an air pump.' 
For the distant prospect of doing what, most probably 
after all, they will never be able to effect, there is no 
degree of present misery and horror to which they 
will not expose the subjects of their experiment. 

As the duty of making proselytes springs from the 
duty of benevolence, there is a priority of choice in 
conversion. The greatest zeal should plainly be di- 
rected to the most desperate misery and ignorance. 
Now, in comparison to many other nations who are 
equally ignorant of the truths of Christianity, the Hin- 
doos are a civilized and a moral people. That they 
have remained in the same state for so many centu- 
ries, is at once a proof that the institutions which esta- 
blished that state could not be highly unfavourable to 
human happiness. After all that has been said of 
the vices of the Hindoos, we believe that an Hindoo 
is more mild and sober than most Europeans, and as 
honest and chaste. In astronomy the Hindoos have 
certainly made very high advances— some, and not an 
unimportant progress in many sciences. As manufac- 
turers, they are extremely ingenious— and as agricul- 
turists, industrious. Christianity would improve them, 
(whom would it not improve ?) but if Christianity 
cannot be extended to all, there are many other na- 
tions who want it more.* 

The Hindoos have some very savage customs, which 
it would be desirable to abolish. Some swing on hooks, 
some run knives through their hands, and widows 
burn themselves to death : but these follies (even the 
last) are quite voluntary on the part of the sufferers. 
We dislike all misery, voluntary or involuntary; but 
the difference between the torments which a man 
chooses, and those which he endures from the choice 
of others, is very great. It is a considerable wretch- 
edness that men and women should be shut up in reli- 
gious houses ; but it is only an object of legislative 
interference, when such incarceration is compulsory. 
Monasteries and nunneries with us would be harmless 
institutions , because the moment a devotee found he 
had acted like a fool, he might avail himself of the 
discovery and run away ; and so may an Hindoo, if he 

* We are here, of course, arguing the question only in a 
worldly point of view. This is one point of view in which 
it must be placed, though certainly the lowest and least im- 
portant. 



repents of his resolution of running hooks into his 
fle"sh. 

The duties of conversion appear to be of less impor- 
tance, when it is impossible to procure proper persons 
to undertake them, and when such religious embassies, 
in consequence, devolve upon the lowest of the people. 
Who Avishes to see scrofula and atheism cured by a 
single sermon in Bengal ? who Avishes to see the refi. 
gious hoy riding at anchor in the Hoogley river ? or 
shoals of jumpers exhibiting their nimble piety before 
the learned Brahmins of Benares ( This madness is 
disgusting and daugerous enough at home. Why are 
Ave to send out little detachments of maniacs to spread . 
over the tine regions of the Avorld the most unjust and 
contemptible opinion of the gospel ? The Avise and 
rational part of the Christian ministry rind they have 
enough to do at home to combat Avith passions unfa- 
vourable to human happiness, and to make men act 
up to their professions. But if a tinker is a devout 
man, he infallibly sets off for the East. Let any man 
read the Anabaptist missions — can he do so Avithout 
deeming such men pernicious and extravagant in their 
OAvn country — and Avithout feeling that they are bene- 
fiting us much more by their absence, than the Hin- 
doos by their advice ? 

It is someAvhat strange, in a duty A\ T hich is stated 
by one party to be so clear and so indispensable, that 
no man of moderation and good sense can be found to 
perform it. And if no other instruments remain but 
visionary enthusiasts, some doubt may be honestly 
raised Avhether it is not better to drop the scheme 
entirely. 

Shortly stated, then, our argument is this : — We see 
not the slightest prospect of success ; — Ave see much 
danger hi making the attempt ; — and Ave doubt if the 
conversion of the Hindoos would ever be more than 
nominal. If it is a duty of general benevolence to 
convert the Heathen, it is less a duty to convert the 
Hindoos than any other people, because they are al- 
ready highly civilized, and because you must infalli- 
bly subject them to infamy and present degradation. 
The instruments employed for these purposes are 
calculated to bring ridicule and disgrace upon the 
gospel ; and in the discretion of those at home, Avhom 
we consider as their patrons, Ave have not the smallest 
reliance ; but, on the contrary, Ave are convinced they 
Avouid behold the loss of our Indian empire, not with 
the humility of men convinced of erroneous vieAvs and 
projects, but Avith the pride, the exultation, and the 
alacrity of martyrs. 

Of the books which have handled this subject on 
either side, Ave have little to say. Major Scott War- 
ing's book is the best against the Missions ; but he 
wants arrangement and prudence. The late resident 
Avrites Avell ; but is miserably fanatical toAvards the 
conclusion. Mr. Cunningham has been diligent in 
looking into books upon the subject : and though an 
evangelical gentleman, is not uncharitable to those 
Avho differ from him in opinion. There is a passage 
in the publication of his reverend brother, Mr. OAven, 
Avhich, had Ave been less accustomed than Ave have 
been of late to this kind of writing, Avouid appear to 
be quite incredible. 

< I have not pointed out the comparative indifference, 
upon Mr. Twining'* principles, between one religion and 
another, to the welfare of a people ; nor the impossibility, 
on those principles, of India being Christianized by any hu- 
man means, so long as it shall remain under the dominion 
of the Company ; nor the alternative to Avhich Providence 
is by consequence reduced, of either giving up that country 
to everlasting superstition, or of working some miracle in 
order to accomplish its conversion.'— Owen's Address, p. 39. 

This is really beyond any thing we ever remember 
to have read. The hoy, the cock-fight, and the re- 
ligious neAvspaper, are pure reason Avhen compared to 
it. The idea ot reducing Providence to an alternative ! ! 
and, by a motion at the India House, carried by bal- 
lot ! We Avouid not insinuate, in the most distant 
manner, that Mr. OAven is not a gentleman of the most 
sincere piety; but the misfortune is, all extra super- 
fine persons accustom themselves to a familiar phra- 
seology upon the most sacred subjects, which is quite 
shocking to the common and inferior orders of Chris- 



CATHOLICS. 



43 



tians. Providence reduced to an alternative ! ! ! ! ! Let 
it be remembered, this phrase comes from a member 
of a religious party, who are loud in their complaints 
of t>eing confounded with enthusiasts and fanatics. 

We cannot conclude without the most pointed repro- 
bation of the low mischief of the Christian Observer ; 
a publication which appears to have no other method 
of discussing a question fairly open to discussion, than 
that of accusing their antagonists of infidelity. No 
art can be more unmanly, or, if its consequences are 
foreseen, more wicked, if this publication had been 
the work of a single individual, we might have passed 
it over in silent disgust ; but as it is looked upon as 
the organ of a great political religious party in this 
country, we think it right to notice the very unworthy 
manner in which they are attempting to extend their 
influence. For ourselves, if there were a fair prospect 
of carrying the gospel into regions where it was before 
unknown, — if such a project did not expose the best 
possessions of the country to extreme danger, and if 
it was in the hands of men who were discreet, as well 
as devout, we should consider it to be a scheme of 
true piety, benevolence, and wisdom : but the base- 
ness and malignity of fanaticism shall never prevent 
us from attacking its arrogance, its ignorance, and its 
activity. For what vice can be more tremendous than 
that which, while it wears the outward appearance of 
religion, destroys the happiness of man, and dishon- 
ours the name of God ? 



CATHOLICS. (Edinburgh Review, 1808.) 

History of the Penal Laws against the Irish Catholics, 
from the Treaty of Limerick to the Union. By Henry 
Parnell, Esq. M. P. 

The various publications which have issued from 
the press in favour of religious liberty, have now near- 
ly silenced the arguments of their opponents ; and, 
teaching sense to some, and inspiring others with 
shame, have left those only on the field who can 
neither learn nor blush. 

But, though the argument is given up, and the justice 
of the Catholic cause admitted, it seems to be gener- 
ally conceived, that their case, at present, is utterly 
hooeless ; and that, to advocate it any longer, will 
only irritate the oppressed, without producing any 
change of opinion in those by whose influence and 
authority that oppression is continued. To this opinion, 
unfortunately too prevalent, we have many reasons 
for not subscribing. 

We do not understand what is meant in this country 
by the notion, that a measure, of consummate wisdom 
and imperious necessity, is to be deferred for any 
time, or to depend upon any contingency. Whenever 
it can be made clear to the understanding of the great 
mass of enlightened people, that any system of poli- 
tical conduct is necessary to the public welfare, every 
obstacle (as it ought) will be swept away before it ; 
and as we conceive it to be by no means improbable, 
that the country may, ere long, be placed in a situa- 
tion where its safety or ruin will depend upon its con- 
duct towards the Catholics, we sincerely believe we 
are doing our duty in throwing every possible light on 
this momentous question. Neither do we understand 
where this passive submission to ignorance and error 
is to end. Is it confined to religion ? or does it ex- 
tend to war and peace, as well as religion ? Would it 
be tolerated, if any man were to say, i Abstain from 
all arguments in favour of peace ; the court have re- 
solved upon eternal war ; and, as you cannot have 
peace, to what purpose urge the necessity of it?' 
We answer,— that courts must be presumed to be 
open to the influence of reason ; or, if they were not, 
to the influence of prudence and discretion, when they 
perceive the public opinion to be loudly and clearly 
against them. To lie by in timid and indolent silence, 
—to suppose an inflexibility, in which no court ever 
could, under pressing circumstances, persevere — and 
to neglect a regular and vigorous appeal to public 
opinion, is to give up all chance of doing good, and to 



abandon the only instrument by which, the few are 
ever prevented from ruining the many. 

It is folly to talk of any other ultimatum in govern- 
ment than perfect justice to the fair claims of the sub- 
ject. The concessions to the Irish Catholics in 1792 
were to be the ne plus ultra. Every engine was set 
on foot to induce the grand juries in Ireland to peti- 
tion against further concessions ; and, in six months 
afterwards, government were compelled to introduce, 
themselves, those further relaxations of the penal code, 
of which they had just before assured the Catholics 
they must abandon all hope. Such is the absurdity 
of supposing that a few interested and ignorant indi- 
viduals can postpone, at their pleasure and caprice, 
the happiness of millions. 

As to the ieeling of irritation with which such con- 
tinued discussion may inspire the Irish Catholics, we 
are convinced that no opinion could be so prejudicial 
to the cordial union which we hope may always sub- 
sist between the two countries, as that all the efforts 
of the Irish were unavailing, — that argument was 
hopeless, — that their case was prejudged with a sullen 
inflexibility which circumstances could not influence, 
pity soften, or reason subdue. 

We are by no means convinced, that the decorous 
silence recommended upon the Catholic question would 
be rewarded by those future concessions, of which 
many persons appear to be so certain. We have a 
strange incredulity where persecution is to be abolish- 
ed, and any class of men restored to their indisputa- 
ble rights. When we see it done, we will believe it. 
Till it is done, we shall always consider it to be high- 
ly improbable — much too improbable — to justify the 
smallest relaxation in the Catholics themselves, or in 
those who are well-wishers to their cause. When the 
fanciful period at present assigned for the emancipa- 
tion arrives, new scruples may arise — fresh forbear- 
ance be called for — and the operations of common 
sense be deferred for another generation. Toleration 
never had a present tense, nor taxation a future one. 
The answer which Paul received from Felix, he owed 
to the subject on which he spoke. When justice and 
righteousness were his theme, Felix told him to go 
away, and he would hear him some other time. All 
men who have spoken to courts upon such disagree- 
able topics, have received the same answer. Felix, 
however, trembled when he gave it ; but his fear was 
ill-directed. He trembled at the subject — he ought to 
have trembled at the delay. 

Little or .nothing is to be expected from the shame of 
deferring what is so wicked and perilous to defer. Pro- 
fligacy in taking office is so extreme, that we have no 
doubt public men may be found, who, for half a cen- 
tury, would postpone all remedies for a, pestilence, if 
the preservation of their places depended upon the 
propagation of the virus. To us, such kind of conduct 
conveys no other action than that of sordid, avaricious 
impudence : it puts to sale the best interests of the 
country for some improvement in the wines and meats 
and carriages which a man uses — and encourages a new 
political morality which may always postpone any 
other great measure — and every other great measure 
as well as the emancipation of the Catholics. 

We terminate this apologetical preamble with ex- 
pressing the most earnest hope that the Catholics will 
not, from any notion that their cause is effectually 
carried, relax in any one constitutional effort necessary 
to their purpose. Their cause is the cause of common 
sense and justice ; the safety of England and of the 
world may depend upon it. It rests upon the soundest 
principles ; leads to the most important consequences ; 
and therefore cannot be too frequently brought before 
the notice of the public. 

The book before us is written by Mr. Henry Parnell, 
the brother of Mr. William Parnell, author of the 
Historical Apology, reviewed in one of our late Num- 
bers ; and it contains a very well written history of 
the penal laws enacted against the Irish Catholics 
from the peace of Limerick, in the reign of King Wil 
liam, to the late Union. Of these we shall present a 
very short, and, we hope even to loungers, a readable 
abstract. 

The war carried on in Ireland against King William 



44 



WORKS OF THE REV. SIDNEY SMITH. 



cannot deserve the name of a rebellion :— it was a 
struggle for their lawful Prince, whom they had sworn 
to maintain; and wjiose zeal for the Catholic religion, 
whatever effect it might have produced in England, 
could not by them be considered as a crime. This war 
terminated by the surrender of Limerick, upon condi- 
tions by which the Catholics hoped, and very rationally 
hoped, to secure to themselves the free enjoyment of 
their religion in future, and an exemption from all 
those civil penalties and incapacities which the reign- 
ing creed is so fond of heaping upon its subjugated 
rivals. 

By the various articles of this treaty, they are to 
enjoy such privileges in the exercise of their religion, 
as they did enjoy in the time of Charles II : and the 
King promises upon the meeting of Parliament, l to 
endeavour to procure for them such further security in 
that particular, as may preserve them from any dis- 
turbance on account of their said religion.' They are to 
be restored to their estates, privileges, and immunities, 
as they enjoyed them in the time of Charles II. The 
gentlemen are to be allowed to carry arms ; and no 
other oath is to be tendered to the Catholics who sub- 
mit to King William than the oath of allegiance. 
These and other articles, King William ratifies for 
himself, his' heirs and successors, as far as in him lies ; 
and confirms the same and every other clause and matter 
therein contained. 

These articles were signed by the English general 
on the 3d of October, 1691 ; and diffused comfort, con- 
fidence, and tranquillity among the Catholics. On the 
22d of October, the English Parliament excluded Ca- 
tholics from the Irish Houses of Lords and Commons, 
by compelling them to take the oaths of supremacy 
before admission. 

In 1695, the Catholics were deprived of all means of 
educating their children, at home or abroad, and of 
the privilege of being guardians to their own or to 
other person's children. Then all the Catholics were 
disarmed — and then all the priests banished. After 
this (probably by way of joke), an act was passed to 
confirm the treaty of Limerick — the great and glorious 
King William totally forgetting the contract he had 
entered into of recommending the religious liberties of 
the Catholics to the attention of Parliament. 

On the 4th of March, 1804, it was enacted, that any 
son of a Catholic who would turn Protestant, should 
succeed to the family estate, which from that moment 
could no longer be sold, or charged with debt and 
legacy. On the same day, Popish fathers were de- 
barred, by a penalty of 500Z., from being guardians to 
their own children. If the child, however young, de- 
clared himself a Protestant, he was to be delivered 
immediately to some Protestant relation. No Pro- 
testant to marry a Papist. No Papist to purchase 
land, or take a lease of land for more than thirty-one 
years. If the profits of the lands so leased by the 
Catholics amounted to above a certain rate settled by 
the act— farm to belong to the first Protestant who made 
the discovery. No Papist to be hi a line of entail; but 
the estate to pass on to the next Protestant heir, as if 
the Papist were dead. If a Papist dies intestate, and 
no Protestant heir can be found, property to be equally 
divided among all the sons ; or, if he has none, among 
all the daughters. By the 16th clause of this bill, no 
Papist to hold any office, civil or military. Not to 
dwell in Limerick or Galway, except on certain con 
ditions. Not to vote at elections. Not to hold advow- 
sons. 

In 1709, Papists were prevented from holding an 
annuity for life. If any son of a Papist chose to turn 
Protestant, and enrol the certificate of his conversion 
in the Court of Chancery, that Court is empowered to 
compel his father to state the value of his property 
upon oath, and to make out of that property a compe- 
tent allowance to the son, at their own discretion, not 
only for his present maintenance, but for his future 
portion after the death of his father. An increase of 
jointure to be enjoyed by Papist wives upon their con- 
version. Papists keeping schools to be prosecuted as 
convicts. Popish priests who are converted, to receive 
30Z. per annum. 

Rewards are given by the same act for the discovery 



of the Popish clergy : 50Z. for discovering a Popish 
bishop ; 201. for a common Popish clergyman ; 101 
for a Popish usher .' Two justices of the peace can 
compel any Papist over eighteen years of age to dis- 
close every particular which has come to his know- 
ledge respecting Popish priests, celebration of mass 
or Papist schools. Imprisonment for a year if he 
refuses to answer. Nobody can hold property in trus.. 
for a Catholic. Juries, in all trials growing out ot 
these statutes, to be Protestants. No Papist to take 
more than two apprentices, except in the linen trade. 
All the Catholic clergy to give in their names and 
places of abode at the quarter-sessions, and to keep 
no curates. Catholics not to serve on grand juries. 
In any trial upon statutes for strengthening the Pro- 
testant interest, a Papist juror may be peremptorily 
challenged. 

In the next reign Popish horses were attached, and 
allowed to be seized for the militia. Papists cannot 
be either high or petty constables. No Papists to 
vote at elections. Papists in towns to provide Pro- 
testant watchmen ; and not to vote at vestries. 

In the reign of George II. Papists were prohibited 
from being barristers. Barristers and solicitors mar- 
rying Papists, considered to be Papists, and subjected 
to all penalties as such. Persons robbed by privateers 
during a war with a Popish prince, to be indemnified 
by grand jury presentments, and the money to be 
levied on the Catholics only. No Papist to marry a 
Protestant ; any priest celebrating such a marriage to 
be hanged. 

During all this time there was not the slightest 
rebellion hi Ireland. 

In 1715 and 1745, while Scotland and the north ot 
England were up in arms, not a man stirred hi Ireland ; 
yet the spirit of persecution against the Catholics 
continued till the 18th of his present Majesty; and 
then gradually gave way to the increase of knowledge, 
the huifumity of our Sovereign, the abilities of Mr 
Grattan, the weakness of England struggling in Ame- 
rica, and the dread inspired by the French revolution. 

Such is the rapid outline of a code of laws which 
reflects indelible disgrace upon the English character, 
and explains but too clearly the cause of that hatred 
in which the English name has been so long held in 
Ireland. It would require centuries to efface such an 
impression ; and yet, when we find it fresh, and ope- 
rating at the end of a few years, we explain the fact 
by every cause which can degrade the Irish, and by 
none which can remind us of our own scandalous 
policy. With the folly and horror of such a code 
before our eyes, with the conviction of recent and 
domestic history, that mankind are not to be lashed 
and chained out of their faith — we are striving to teaze 
and worry them into a better theology. Heavy op- 
pression is removed ; fight insults and provocations 
are retained ; the scourge does not fall upon their 
shoulders, but it sounds in their ears. And this is the 
conduct we are pursuing, when it is still a great doubt 
whether this country alone may not be opposed to the 
united efforts of the whole of Europe. It is reaUj 
difficult to ascertain which is the most utterly destitute 
of common sense — the capricious and arbitrary stoji 
we have made in our concessions to the Catholics, or 
the precise period we have chosen for this grand effort 
of obstinate folly. 

In whatsoever manner the contest now in agitation 
on the Continent may terminate, its relation to the 
emancipation of the Catholics will be very striking. 
If the Spaniards succeed hi establishing their own lib- 
erties, and hi rescuing Europe from the tyranny under 
which it at present labours, it will still be contended. 
within the walls of our own Parliament, that the Cath- 
olics cannot fulfil the duties of social life. Venal pol- 
iticians will still argue that the time is not yet come. 
Sacred and lay sycophants will still lavish upon the 
Catholic faith their well-paid abuse, and England still 
passively submit to such a disgraceful spectacle of in- 
gratitude and injustice. If, on the contrary (as may 
probably be the case), the Spaniards fall before the 
numbers and military skill of the French, then are we 
left alone in the world, without another ray of hope 
and compelled to employ against internal disaffection 



METHODISM. 



that force which, exalted to its utmost energy, would 
in all probability prove but barely equal to the exter- 
nal danger by which we should be surrounded. Whence 
comes it that these things are universally admitted to 
be true, but looked upon in servile silence by a coun- 
try hitherto accustomed to make great efforts for its 
prosperity, safety, and independence ? 



METHODISM. (Edinburgh Review.) 

Strictures on two Critiques in the Edinburgh Review, 
on the Subject of Methodism and Missions ■ with Re- 
marks on the Influence of Reviews, in general, on Mor- 
als and Happiness. By John Styles. 8vo. Lon- 
don, 1809. 



In routing out a nest of consecrated cobblers, and in 
bringing to light such a perilous heap of trash as we 
were obliged to work through, in our articles upon the I We agree with him, that ridicule is"not exactly the 



Methodists to have been attacked; but Mr. John 
Styles should remember, that it is not the practice 
with destroyers of vermin to allow the little victims a 
veto upon the weapons used against them. If this 
were otherwise, we should have one set of vermim 
banishing small -tooth combs; another protesting 
against mouse -traps ; a third prohibiting the fingei 
and thumb ; a fourth exclaiming against the intolera- 
ble infamy of using soap and water. It is impossible 
however, to listen to such pleas. They must all be 
caught, killed, and cracked, in the manner, and by the 
instruments which are found most efficacious to their 
destruction ; and the more they cry out, the greater 
plainly is the skill used against them. We are con- 
vinced a little laughter will do them more harm than 
all the arguments in the world. Such men as the au- 
thor before us cannot understand when they are out- 
argued ; but he has given us a specimen, from his irri- 
tability, that he fully comprehends when he has be- 
come the object of universal contempt and derision. 



Methodists and Missionaries, we are generally con 
ceived to have rendered an useful service to the cause 
of rational religion. Every one, however, at all ac- 
quainted with the true character of Methodism, must 
have known the extent of the abuse and misrepresen- 
tation to which we exposed ourselves in such a ser- 
vice. All this obloquy, however, we were very will- 
ing to encounter, from our conviction of the necessity 
of exposing and correcting the growing evil of fanati- 
cism. In spite of all misrepresentation, we have ever 
been, and ever shall be, the sincere friends of sober 
and rational Christianity. We are quite ready, if any 
fair opportunity occur, to defend it, to the best of our 
ability, from the tiger-spring of infidelity ; and we are 
quite determined, if we can prevent such, an evil, that 
it shall not be eaten up by the nasty and numerous 
vermin of Methodism. For this purpose, we shall pro- 
ceed to make a few short remarks upon the sacred 
and silly gentleman before us, — not, certainly, be- 
cause we feel any sort of anxiety as to the effect of 
his strictures on our own credit or reputation, but be- 
cause his direct and articulate defence of the princi- 
ples and practices which we have condemned, affords 
as the fairest opportunity of exposing, still more clear- 
ly, both the extravagance and the danger of these 
popular sectaries. 

These very impudent people have one ruling canon, 
which pervades every thing they say and do. Who- 
is unfriendly to Methodism, is an infidel and an atheist. 
This reasonable and amiable maxim, repeated, in 
every form of dulness, and varied in every attitude of 
malignity, is the sum and substance of Mr. Style's 
pamphlet. Whoever wishes to rescue religion from 
the hands of didactic artisans, — whoever prefers a re- 
spectable clergyman for his teacher to a delirious me- 
chanic, — whoever wishes to keep the intervals be 
teen churches and lunatic asylumns as wide as possi- 
ble, — all such men, in the estimation of Mr. Styles 
are nothing better than open or concealed enemies of 
• Christianity. His catechism is very simple. In what 
hoy do you navigate ? By what shoemaker or carpen 
ter are you instructed? What miracles have you to 
relate ? Do you think it sinful to reduce Providence to 
an alternative, &c. &c. &c. Now, if we were to con- 
tent ourselves with using to Mr. Styles, while he is 
dealing about his imputations of infidelity, the un- 
courtly language which is sometimes applied to those 
who are little curious about truth or falsehood, what 
Methodist would think the worse of him for such an 
attack ? Who is there among them that would not 
glory to he for the taberqacle ? who that would not 
believe he was pleasing his Maker, by sacrificing 
truth, justice, and common sense, to the interests of 
his own little chapel, and his own deranged instruc- 
tor ? Something more than contradiction or confuta- 
tion, therefore, is necessary to discredit those charita- 
ble dogmatists, and to diminish their pernicious influ- 
ence ; — and the first accusation against us is, that we 
have endeavoured to add ridicule to reasoning. 
We are a good deal amused, indeed, with the ex. 



weapon to be used in matters of religion ; but the use 
of it is excusable, when there is no other which can 
make fools tremble. Besides, he should remember the 
particular sort of ridicule we have used, which is 
nothing more than accurate quotation from the Meth- 
odists themselves. It is true, that this is the most se- 
vere and cutting ridicule to which we could have had 
recourse ; but, whose fault is that? 

Nothing can be more disingenuous than the attacks 
Mr. Styles has made upon us for our use of Scripture 
language. Light and grace are certainly terms of 
Scripture. It is not to the words themselves that any 
ridicule can ever attach. It is from the preposterous 
application of those words, in the mouths of the most 
arrogant and ignorant of human beings ; — it is from 
their use in the most trivial, low, and familiar scenes 
of life ; — it is from the illiterate and ungrammatical 
prelacy of Mr. John Styles, that any tinge of ridicule 
ever is or ever can be imparted to the sacred language 
of Scripture. 

We admit also, with this gentleman, that it would 
certainly evince the most vulgar and contracted heart, 
to ridicule any religious opinions, methodistical or 
otherwise, because thej%vere the opinions of the poor, 
and were conveyed in the language of the poor. But 
are we to respect the poor, when they wish to step 
out of their province, and become the teachers of the 
land ? — when men, whose proper ' talk is of bullocks, 
pretend to have wisdom and understanding,' is it not 
lawful to tell them they have none ? An ironmonger 
is a very respectable man, so long as he is merely an 
ironmonger, — an admirable man if he is a religious 
ironmonger ; but a great blockhead if he sets up for a 
bishop or a dean, and lectures upon theology. It is 
not the poor we have attacked, — but the writing poor, 
the publishing poor, — the limited arrogance which 
mistakes its own trumpery sect for the world: nor 
have we attacked them for want of talent, but for 
want of modesty, want of sense, and want of true ra- 
tional religion, — for every fault which Mr. John Styles 
defends and exemplifies. 

It is scarcely possible to reduce the drunken decla- 
mations of Methodism to a point, to grasp the wrig- 
gling lubricity of these cunning animals, and to fix 
them in one position. We have said, in our review of 
the Methodists, that it is extremely wrong to suppose 
that Providence interferes with special and extraordi- 
nary judgments on every trifling occasion of life : that 
to represent an innkeeper killed for preventing a Meth- 
odist meeting, or loud claps of thunder rattling along 
the heavens, merely to hint to Mr. Scott that he was 
not to preach at a particular tabernacle in Oxford- 
road, appeared to us to be blasphemous and mischie- 
vous nonsense. With great events, which change the 
destiny of mankind, we might suppose such interfe- 
rence, the discovery of which, upon every trifling oc- 
casion, we considered to be pregnant with very mis- 
chievous consequences. To all which Mr. Styles 
replies, that, with Providence, nothing is great, or 
nothing little, — nothing difiicultj or nothing easy ; that 



treme disrelish which Mr. John Styles exhibits to the a worm and a whale are equal in the estimation of a 
humour and pleasantry with which he admits the ' SuDreme Being. But did any human being but a Metb/ 



WORKS OF THE REV. SIDNEY SMITH. 



odist, and a third or fourth rate Methodist, ever make 
such a reply to such an argument ? We are not talk- 
ing about what is great or important to Providence, 
but to us. The creation of a worm or a whale, a New- 
ton or a Styles, are tasks equally easy to Omnipo- 
tence. But are they, in their results, equally import- 
ant to us ? The lightning may as easily strike the 
head of the French emperor, as of an innocent cotta- 
ger ; but we are surely neither impious nor obscure, 
when we say, that one would be an important interfe- 
rence of Providence, and the other comparatively not 
bo. But it is a loss of time to reply to such trash ; it 
presents no stimulus of difficulty to us, nor would it 
offer any of novelty to our readers. 

To our attack upon the melancholy tendency of Me- 
thodism, Mr. Styles replies, ' that a man must have 
studied in the schools of Hume, Voltaire, and Kotzebue, 
who can plead in behalf of the theatre ; that, at fash- 
ionable ball-rooms and assemblies, seduction is drawn 
out to a system ; that dancing excites the fever of the 
passions, and raises a delirium too often fatal to inno- 
cence and peace ; and that for the poor, instead of the 
common rough amusements to which they are now 
addicted, there remain the simple beauties of nature, 
the gay colours, and the scented perfumes of the 
earth.' These are the blessings which the common 
people have to expect from their Methodistical in- 
structors. They are pilfered of all their money, shut 
out from all their dances and country wakes, and are 
then sent pennyless into the fields, to gaze on the 
clouds, and to smell dandelions ! 

Against the orthodox clergy of all descriptions, our 
sour devotee proclaims, as was to have been expected, 
the most implacable war, declaring that, in one century, 
they would have obliterated all the remaining practical 
religion in the church, had it not been for this new sect, 
everywhere spoken against.'' Undoubtedly, the dis- 
tinction of mankind into godly and ungodly — if by 
godly is really meant those who apply religion to 
the extinction of bad passions — would be highly de- 
sirable. But when, by that word, is only intended a 
sect more desirous of possessing the appellation than 
of deserving it — when, under that term, are compre- 
hended thousands of canting hypocrites and raving 
enthusiasts — men despicable from their ignorance, 
and formidable from their madness — the distinction 
may hereafter prove to be truly terrific ; and a dy- 
nasty of fools may again sweep away both church and 
state in one hideous ruin. There maybe, at present, 
some very respectable men at the head of these ma- 
niacs, who would insanify them with some degree of 
prudence, and keep them only half mad, if they could. 
But this won't do ; Bedlam will break loose, and over- 
power its keepers. If the preacher sees visions, and 
has visitations, the clerk will come next, and then the 
congregation ; every man will be his own prophet, and 
dream dreams for himself : the competition in extrava- 
gance will be hot and lively, and the whole island a re- 
ceptacle for incurables. There is, at this moment, a 
man in London who prays for what garments he wants, 
and finds them next morning in his room, tight and fit- 
ting. This man, as might be expected, gains between 
two and three thousand a year from the common peo- 
ple, by preaching. Anna, the prophetess, encamps in 
the woods of America, with thirteen or fourteen thou- 
sand followers, and has visits every night from the 
prophet Elijah. Joanna Southcote raises the dead, 
&c &c. Mr. Styles will call us atheists, and disciples 
of the French school, for what we are about to say ; 
but it is our decided opinion, that there is some fraud* in 
the prophetic visit ; and it is but too probable, that 
the clothes are merely human, and the man measured 
for them in the common way. When such blasphem- 
ous deceptions are practised upon mankind, how can 
remonstrance be misplaced, or exposure mischievous ? 
If the choice rested with us, we should say— give us 
back our wolves again, restore us our Danish invaders, 
curse us with any evil but the evil of a canting, deluded, 
and Methodistical populace. Wherever Methodism 
extends its banetul influence, the character of the 
English people is constantly changed by it. Boldness 



and rough honesty are broken down into meanness 
prevarication, and fraud. 

While Mr. Styles is so severe upon the indolence o* 
the Church, he should recollect that his Methodists 
are the ex-party; that it is not in human nature, that 
any persons who quietly possess power, can be as ac ; 
tive as those who are pursuing it. The fair way to 
state the merit of the two parties is, to estimate what 
the exertions of the lachrymal and suspirous clergy 
would be, if they stepped into the endowments of 
their competitors. The moment they ceased to be 

{>aid by the groan, the instant that Easter offerings no 
onger depended upon jumping and convulsions. Mr 
Styles may assure himself, that the character of his 
darling preachers would be totally changed ; their 
bodies would become quiet, and their minds reason- 
able. 

It is not true, as this bad writer is perpetually saying, 
that the world hates pietj 7 . That modest and unob- 
trusive piety which fills the heart with all human cha- 
rities, and makes a man gentle to others, and severe to 
himself, is an object of universal love and veneration. 
But mankind hate the lust of power when it is veiled 
under the garb of piety ; they hate canting and hypoc- 
risy ; they hate advertisers and quacks and piety ; 
they do not choose to be insulted ; they love to tear 
folly and imprudence from that altar which should 
only be a sanctuary for the wretched and the good. 

Having concluded his defence of Methodism, this fa- 
natical writer opens upon us his Missionary battery, 
firing away with the most incessant fury, and calling 
names, all the time, as loud as lungs accustomed to 
the eloquence of the tub usually vociferate. In speak- 
ing of the cruelties which their religion entails upon the 
Hindoos, Mr. Styles is peculiarly severe upon us for not 
being more shocked at their piercing their limbs with 
kimes. This is rather an unfair mode of alarming his 
readers with the idea of some unknown instrument. 
He represents himself as having paid considerable 
attention to the manners and customs of the Hindoos ; 
and, therefore, the peculiar stress he lays upon this 
instrument is naturally calculated to produce, in the 
minds of the humane, a great degree of mysterious 
terror. A drawing of the kime was imperiously called 
for ; and the want of it is a subtle evasion, for which 
Mr. Styles is fairly accountable. As he has been si- 
lent on this subject, it is for us to explain the plan and 
nature of this terrible and unknown piece of mechan- 
ism. A kime, then, is neither more nor less than a 
false print in the Edingburgh Review for a knife ; and 
from this blunder of the printer has Mr. Styles manu- 
factured this Daedalean instrument of torture called a 
kime ! We were at first nearly persuaded by his ar- 
guments against kimes ; we grew frightened ; we 
stated to ourselves the horror of not sending mission- 
aries to a nation that used kimes ; we were struck 
with the nice and accurate information of the Taber- 
nacle upon this important subject ; but we looked into 
the errata, and found Mr. Styles to be always Mr. 
Styles, always cut off from every hope of mercy, and 
remaining for ever himself. 

Mr. Styles is right in saying we have abolished • 
many practices of the Hindoos since the establishment 
of our empire ; but then we have always consulted the 
Brahmins, whether or not such practices were conform- 
able to their religion ; and it is upon the authority of 
their condemnation that we have proceeded to aboli- 
tion. 

To the whole of Mr. Styles's observations upon the 
introduction of Christianity into India, we have one 
short answer : — it is not Christianity which is intro- 
duced there, but the debased mummery and nonsense 
of Methodists, which has little more to do with the 
Christian religion than it has to do with the religion of 
China. We would as soon consent that Brodum and 
Solomon should carry the medical art of Europe into 
India, as that Mr. Styles and his Anabaptists should 
give to the Eastern World their notions of our religion. 
We send men of the highest character for the adminis- 
tration of justice and the regulation of trade ; nay, we 
take great pains to impress upon the minds of the na» 



METHODISM. 



47 



lives the highest ideas of our arts and manufactures, 
by laying before them the finest specimens of our skill 
and ingenuity. Why, then, are common sense and de- 
cency to be forgotten in religion alone ? and so foolish 
a set of men allowed to engage themselves in this oc- 
cupation, that the natives almost instinctively duck 
and pelt them ? But the missionaries, we are told, 
have mastered the languages of the East. They may 
also, for aught we know, in the same time, have learnt 
perspective, astronomy, or anything else. What is all 
this to us ? Our charge is, that they want sense, con- 
duct, and sound religion ; and that, if they are not 
watched, the throat of every European in India will be 
cut : — the answer to which is, that their progress in 
languages is truly astonishing ! If they expose us to 
eminent peril, what matters it if they have every vir- 
tue under heaven ? We are not writing dissertations 
upon the intellect of Brother Carey, but stating his 
character so far as it concerns us, and caring for it no 
further. But these pious gentlemen care nothing about 
the loss of the country. The plan, it seems, is this :— 
We are to educate India in Christianity, as a parent 
does his child ; and, when it is perfect in its catechism, 
then to pack up, quit it entirely, and leave it to its own 
management. This is the evangelical project for se- 
parating a colony from the parent country. They see 
nothing of the bloodshed, massacres, and devastations, 
nor of the speeches in parliament, squandered millions, 
fruitless expeditions, jobs and pensions, with which the 
loss of our Indian possessions would necessarily be ac- 
companied ; nor will they see that these consequences 
could arise from the attempt, and not from the comple- 
tion, of their scheme of conversion. We should be 
swept from the peninsula by Pagan zealots ; and 
should lose, among other things, all chance of really 
converting them. 

What is the use, too, of telling us what these men 
endure ? Suffering is not a merit, but only useful suf- 
fering. Prove to us that they are fit men, doing a fit 
thing, and we are ready to praise the missionaries ; 
but it gives no pleasure to hear that a man has walked 
a thousand miles with peas in his shoes, unless we 
mow why, and wherefore, and to what good purpose 
ae has done it. 

But these men, it is urged, foolish and extravagant 
as they are, may be very useful precursors of the 
established clergy. This is much as if a regular phy- 
sician should send a quack doctor before him, and 
say, do you go and look after this disease for a day or 
two, and ply the patient well with your nostrums, and 
then I will step in and complete the cure ;• a more 
notable cure Ave have seldom heard of. Its patrons 
forget that these self-ordained ministers, with Mr. 
John Styles at their head, abominate the established 
clergy ten thousand times more than they do Pagans, 
who cut themselves with cruel kimes. The efforts of 
these precursors would be directed with infinitely 
more zeal to make the Hindoos disbelieve in Bishops, 
than to make them believe in Christ. The darling 
passion in the soul of every missionary is, not to teach 
the great leading truths of the Christian faith, but to 
enforce the little paltry modification and distinction 
which he first taught from his own tub. And then 
what a way of teaching Christianity is this ! There 
are five sects, if not six, now employed as missionaries, 
every one instructing the Hindoos in their own parti- 
cular method of interpreting the Scriptures ; and when 
these have completely succeeded, the Church of Eng- 
land is to step in, and convert them all over again to 
its own doctrines. There is, indeed, a very fine varnish 
of probability over this ingenious and plausible scheme. 
Mt. John Styles, however, would much rather see a 
kime in the flesh of an Hindoo than the hand of a 
Bishop on his head. 

The missionaries complain of intolerance. A weasel 
might as well complain of intolerance when it is throt- 
tled for sucking eggs. Toleration for their own 
opinions — toleration for their domestic worship, for 
their private groans and convulsions, they possess in 
the fullest extent ; but who ever heard of tolerance for 
intolerance? Who ever before heard men cry out 
they were persecuted, because they might not hi suit 
the religion; shock the feelings, irritate the passions of 



their fellow creatures, and throw a whole colony into 
bloodshed and confusion ? We did not say that a man 
was not an object of pity who tormented himself from 
a sense of duty, but that he was not so great an object 
of pity as one equally tormented by the tyranny of 
another, and without any sense of duty to support him. 
Let Mr. Styles first inflict forty lashes upon himself, 
then let him allow an Edinburgh Reviever to give him 
forty more — he will find no comparison between the 
two flagellations. 

These men talk of the loss of our possessions in 
India as if it made the argument against them only 
more or less strong; whereas, in our estimation, it 
makes the argument against them conclusive, and 
shut* up the case. Two men possess a cow, and they 
quarrel violently how they shall manage this cow. 
They will surely both of them (if they have a particle 
of common sese) agree, that there is an absolute ne- 
cessity for preventing the cow from running away. It 
is not only the loss of India that is in question — but 
how will it be lost ? By the massacre of ten or twenty 
thousand English, by the blood of our sons and bro- 
thers, who have been toiling so many years to return 
to their native country. But what is all this to a fero- 
cious Methodist? What care brothers Barrel and 
Ringletub for us and our colonies ? 

If it it were possible to invent a method by which 
a few men sent from a distant country could hold such 
masses of people as Hindoos in subjection, that method 
would be the institution of castes. There is no insti- 
tution which can so effectually curb the ambition of 
genius, reconcile the individual more completely to his 
station, and reduce the varieties of human character to 
such a state of insipid and monotonous tameness ; and 
yet the religion which destroys castes is said to render 
our empire in India more certain ! It may be our 
duty to make the Hindoos Christians — that is another 
argument : but, that we shall by so doing strengthen 
our empire, we utterly deny. What signifies identity 
of religion to a question of this kind ? Diversity of 
bodily colour and of language would soon overpower 
this consideration. Make the Hindoos enterprising, 
active, and reasonable as yourselves — destroy the 
eternal track in which they have moved for ages — and, 
in a moment, they would sweep you off the face of the 
earth. Let us ask, too, if the Bible is universally dif- 
fused in Hindostan, what must be the astonishment 
of the natives to find that we are forbidden to rob, 
murder, and steal ; we who, in fifty years have extended 
our empire from a few acres about Madras over the 
whole peninsula, and sixty millions of people, and ex- 
emplified in our public conduct every crime of which 
human nature is capable. What matchless impudence 
to follow up such practice with such precepts ! If we 
have common prudence, let us keep the gospel at 
home, and tell them that Machiavel is our prophet 
and the god of the Manicheans our god. 

There is nothing which digusts us more than the 
familiarity these impious coxcombs affect with the 
ways and designs of Providence. Every man, now-a- 
days, is an Amos or a Malachi. One rushes out of his 
chambers, and tells us we are beaten by the French, 
because we do not abolish the slave trade. Another 
assures us that we have no chance of victory till India 
is evangelized. The new Christians are now come to 
speak of the ways of their Creator with as much confi- 
dence as they would of the plan of an earthly ruler. 
We remember when the ways of God to man were 
gazed upon with trembling humility— -when they were 
called inscrutable — when piety looked to another scene 
of existence for the true explanation of this ambiguous 
and distressing world. We were taught in our child- 
hood that this was true religion ; but it turns out now 
to be nothing but atheism and infidelity. If any thing 
could surprise us from the pen of a Methodist, we 
should be truly surprised at the very irreligious and 
presumptous answer which Mr. Styles makes to some 
of our arguments. Our title to one of the anecdotes 
from the Methodist Magazine is as follows : l A sinner 
punished — a Bee the instrument;' to which Mr. Styles 
replies, that we might as well ridicule the Scriptures, 
by relating their contents in the same ludicrous man- 
ner An inict ferencc with respect to a travelling Jew • 



4& 



WORKS OF THE REV. SIDNEY SMITH. 



blindness the consequence. Acts, the ninth chapter, and 
first nine verses. The account of Paul's conversion, 
8,-c. fyc. 4-c, page 38. But does Mr. Styles forget, that 
the .one is a shameless falsehood, introduced to sell a 
twopenny book, and the other a miracle recorded by 
inspired writers ! In the same manner, when we ex- 
press our surprise that sixty millions of Hindoos should 
be converted by four men and sixteen guineas, he asks, 
what would have become of Christianity if the twelve 
Apostles had argued in the same way? It is impos- 
sible to make this infatuated" gentleman understand 
that the lies of the Evangelical Magazine are not the 
miracles of Scripture ; and that the Baptist Mission- 
aries are not the Apostles. He seriously expects that 
we should*speak of Brother Carey as we would speak 
of St. Paul ; and treat with an equal respect the miracles 
of the Magazine and the Gospel. 

Mr. Styles knows very well that we have never said 
because a nation has present happiness, that it can 
, therefore dispense with immortal happiness ; but we 
liave said that, where of two nations both cannot be 
made Christians, it is more the duty of a missionary to 
convert the one, which is exposed to every evil of bar- 
barism, than the other possessing every blessing of 
civilization. Our argument is merely comparative: 
Mr. Styles must have known it to be so : but who does 
not love the Tabernacle better than truth ? When the 
tenacity of the Hindoos on the subject of their religion 
is adduced as a reason against the success of the mis- 
sions, the friends of this understanding are always fond 
of reminding us how patiently the Hindoos submitted 
to the religious persecutions and butchery of Tippoo. 
The inference from such citations is truly alarming. 
It is the imperious duty of Government to watch some 
of these men most narrowly. There is nothing of 
which they are not capable. And what, after all, did 
Tippoo effect in the way of conversion ? How many 
Mahomedans did he make ? There was all the. car- 
nage of Medea's Kettle, andnone of the transformation. 
He deprived multitudes of Hindoos of their caste, 
indeed ; and cut them off from all the benefits of their 
religion. That he did, and we may do, by violence : 
but, did he make Mahomedans ? — or shall we make 
Christians? This, however, it seems, is a matter of 
pleasantry. To make a poor Hindoo hateful to himself 
and his kindred, and to fix a curse upon him to the end 
of his days ! — we have no doubt but that this is very 
entertaining ; and particularly to the friends of tolera- 
tion. But our ideas of comedy have been formed in 
another school. We are dull enough to think, too, that 
it is more innocent to exile pigs than to offend con- 
science, and destroy human happiness. The scheme 
of baptizing with beef broth is about as brutal and 
preposterous as the assertion that you may vilify the 
gods and priests of the Hindoos with safety, provided 
you do not meddle with their turbans and toupees, 
(which are cherished solely on a principle of religion) ', 
is silly and contemptible. After all, if the Mahome- 
dan did persecute the Hindoos with impunity, is that 
any precedent of safety to a government, that offends 
every feeling both of Mahomedan and Hindoo at the 
same time? You have a tiger and a buffalo in the 
same enclosure ; and the tiger drives the buffalo before 
him ; is it therefore prudent in you to do that which 
will irritate them both, and bring their united strength 
upon you ? 

In answer to the low malignity of this author, we 
have only to reply, that we are, as we always have 
been, sincere friends to the conversion of the Hindoos. 
We admit the Hindoo religion to be full of follies, 
and full of enormities ; — we think conversion a great 
duty — and could think it, if it could be effected, a 
great blessing ; but our opinion of the missionaries 
and of their employers is such, that we most firmly 
believe, in less than twenty years, for the conversion 
of a few degraded wretches, who would he neither 
Methodists nor Hindoos, they would infallibly pro- 
duce the massacre of every European in India ;* the 

* Every opponent says of Major Scott's book, ' What a 
dangerous book ! the arrival of it at Calcutta may throw 
.no whole Indian empire into confusion ; — and yet these are 
he people whose religious prejudices may be insulted with 
impunity. 



loss of our settlements, and, consequently, of the 
chance of that slow, solid, and temperate introduction 
of Christianity, which the superiority of the European 
character may ultimately effect in the Eastern 
world. The Board of Control (all Atheists, and dis- 
ciples of Voltaire, of course) are so entirely of our 
way of thinking, that the most peremptory orders 
have been issued to send all the missionaries home 
upon the slightest appearance of disturbance. Those 
who have sons and brothers in India may now sleep 
in peace. Upon the transmission of this order, Mr, 
Styles is said to have destroyed himself with a kime 



HANNAH MORE. (Edinburgh Review, 1S09.) 

Calebs in Search of a Wife ; comprehending Observations on 
Domestic Habits and Manners, Religion and Morals. 2 
Vols. London, 1809. 

This book is written, or supposed to be written, 
(for we would speak timidly of the mysteries of supe- 
rior beings,) by the celebrated Mrs. Hannah More ! 
We shall probably give great offence by such indis- 
cretion ; but still we must be excused for treating ' it 
•as a book merely human, — an uninspired production, 
— the result of mortality left to itself, and depending 
on its own limited resources. In taking up the sub- 
ject in this point of view, we solemnly disclaim the 
slightest intention of indulging in any indecorous 
levity, or of wounding the religious feelings of a large 
class of very respectable persons. It is the only me- 
thod in, which we can make this work a proper object 
of criticism. We have the strongest possible doubts 
of the attributes usually ascribed to this authoress; 
and we think it more simple and manly to say so at 
once, than to admit nominally superlunary claims, 
which, in the progress of our remarks, we should vir- 
tually deny. 

CcElebs wants a wife ; and, after the death of hie 
father, quits his estate in Northumberland to see the 
world, and to seek for one of its best productions, a 
woman, who may add materially to the happiness of 
his future life. His first journey is to London, where, 
in the midst of the gay society of the metropolis, ol 
course, he does not find a wife. The exaltation ; 
therefore, of what the authoress deems to be the reli 
gious, and the depreciation of what she considers to be 
the worldly character, and the influence of both upon 
matrimonial happiness, form the subject of this novel. 
— rather, of this dramatic sermon. 

The machinery upon which the discourse is suspen- 
ded is of the slightest and most inartificial texture, 
bearing every mark of haste, and possessing not the 
slightest claim to merit. Events there are none ; and 
scarcely a character of any interest. The book is in- 
tended to convey religious advice ; and no more labour 
appears to have been bestowed upon the story than 
was merely sufficient to throw it out of the dry, didac- 
tic form. Lucilla is totally uninteresting ; so is Mr. 
Stanley ; Dr. Barlow is still worse ; and Caelebs a mere 
clod or dolt. Sir John and Lady Belfleld are rather 
more interesting — and for a very obvious reason : they 
have some faults ; — they put us in mind of men and 
women ; — they seem to belong to one common nature 
with ourselves. As we readj we seem to think we 
might act as such people act, and therefore we attend ; 
whereas imitation is hopeless in the more perfect 
characters which Mrs. More has set before us ; and 
therefore they inspire us with very little interest. 

There are books, however, of all kinds ; and those 
may not be unwisely planned which set before us very 
pure models. They are less probable, and therefore 
less amusing, than ordinary stories ; but they are more 
amusing than plain, unfabled precept. Sir Cbarles 
Grandison is less agreeable than Tom Jones ; but it is 
more agreeable than Sherlock and Tillotson ; and 
teaches religion and morality to many who would not 
seek it in the productions of those professional writers. 

But, making every allowance for the difficulty of the 
task which Mrs. More has prescribed to herself, the 
book abounds with marks of negligence and want of 
skill ; with representations of life and manners which 
are either false or trite. 



HANNAH MORE. 



42 



Temples to friendship and virtue must be totally- 
laid aside, for many years to come, in novels. Mr. 
Lane, of the Minerva Press, has given them up long 
since ; and we are quite surprised to find such a writer 
as Mrs. More busied in moral brick and mortar. Such 
an idea, at first, was merely juvenile ; the second time 
a little nauseous ; but the ten thousandth time it is 
quite intolerable. Crelebs, upon his first arrival in 
London, dines out, — meets with a bad dinner, — suppo- 
ses the cause of that bad dinner to be the erudition of 
the ladies of the house, — talks to them upon learned 
subjects, and finds them as dull and ignorant as if they 
hud piqued themselves upon all the mysteries of house- 
wifery. We humbly submit to Mrs. More, that this is 
not humorous, but strained and unnatural. Philippics 
against frugivorous children after dinner are too com- 
mon. Lady Melbury has been introduced into every 
novel for these four years last past. Peace to her 
ashes ! 

The characters in this novel which evince the great- 
est skill are unquestionably those of Mrs. Ranby and 
her daughters. There are some scenes in this part of 
the book extremely well painied, and which evince 
that Mrs. More could amuse, in no common degree, if 
amusement was her object. 

" At tea I found the young ladies took no more interes* 
in the conversation than they had done at dinner, but sat 
whispering and laughing, and netting white silk gloves, till 
they were summoned to the harpsichord. Despairing of 
getting on with them in company, I proposed a walk in the 
garden. I now found them as willing to talk as destitute 
of any thing to say. Their conversation was vapid and 
frivolous. They laid great stress on small things. They 
Eeemed to have no shades in their understanding, but used 
the strongest terms for the commonest occasions 5 and ad- 
miration was excited by things hardly worthy to command 
attention. They were extremely glad and extremely sorry 
on subjects not calculated to excite aifections of any kind. 
They were animated about trifles, and indifferent on things 
of importance. They were, I must confess, frank and good- 
natured ; but it was evident that, as they were too open to 
nave any thing to conceal, so they were too uninformed to 
nave any thing to produce ; and I was resolved not to risk 
my happiness with a woman who could not contribute her 
full share towards spending a wet winter cheerfully in the 
country.'— (I. 54, 55.) 

This trait of character appears to us to be very good. 
The following passage is still better. 

■« In the evening, Mrs. Ranby was lamenting in general, 
in rather customary terms, her own exceeding sinfulness. 
Mr. Ranby said, " You accuse yourself rather too heavily, 
my dear; you have sins to be sure." "And pray what 
/ sins have I, Mr. Ranby ?" said she, turning upon him with 
so much quickness that the poor man started. "Nay," 
said he, meekly, " I did not mean to offend you ; so far 
from it, that, hearing you condemn yourself grievously, I 
intended to comfort you, and to say that, except a few 

faults ." " And pray what faults ?" interrupted she, 

continuing to speak, however, lest he should catch an in- 
terval to tell them. " I defy you, Mr. Ranby, to produce 
one." "My dear," replied he, "as you charged yourself 
with all, I thought it would be letting you off cheaply, by 

naming only two or three, such as ." Here, fearing 

matters would go too far, I interposed ; and, softening 
things as much I could for the lady, said, " I conceived that 
Mr. Ranby meant, that though she partook of the general 

corruption " Here Ranby, interrupting me with 

more spirit than I thought he possessed, said, " General 
corruption, sir, must be the source of particular corruption. 
I did not mean that my wife was worse than other women." 
— "Worse, Mr. Ranby, worse?" cried she, Ranby, for 
the first time in his life, not minding her, went on, " As 
she is always insisting that the whole species is corrupt, she 
cannot help allowing that she he*rself has not quite escaped 
the infection. Now, to be a sinner in the gross, and a saint 

. in the detail — that is, to have all sins, and no faults — is a 
thing I do not quite comprehend." 

' After he had left the room, which he did as the shortest 
way of allaying the storm, she, apologizing for him, said, 
" he was a well-meaning man, and acted up to the little 
light he had ;" but added, " that he was unacquainted with 
religious feelings, and knew little of the nature of conver- 

• sion." 

« Mrs. Ranby, I found, seems to consider Christianity as 
a kind of free-masonry ; and therefore thinks it superfluous 
to speak on serious subjects to any but the initiated. If 
they do not return the sign, she gives them up as blind and 
dead. She thinks she can only make herself intelligible to 
those to whom certain peculiar phrases are familiar : and 



though her friends may be correct, devout, and both doc- 
trinally and practically pious ; yet, if they cannot catch a 
certain mystic meaning — if there is not a sympathy of in- 
telligence between her and them — if they do not fully con 
ceive of impressions, and cannot respond to mysterious 
communications, she holds them unworthy of intercourse 
with her. She does not so much insist on high moral ex- 
cellence as the criterion of their worth, as on their own ac- 
count of their internal feelings.'— (I. 60—63.) 

The great object kept, in view, throughout the 
whole of this introduction, is the enforcement of reli- 
gious principle, and the condemnation of a life lavished 
in dissipation and fashionable amusement. In the pur- 
suit of this object, it appears to us that Mrs. More is 
much too severe upon the ordinary amusements of 
mankind, many of which she does not object to in this 
or that degree, but altogether. Caelebs and Lucilla, 
her optimus and optima, never dance, and never go to 
the play. They not only stay away from the come- 
dies of Congreve and Farquhar, for which they may 
easily enough be forgiven — but they never go to see 
Mrs. Siddons in the Gamester, or in Jane Shore. The 
finest exhibition of talent, and the most beautiful mo- 
ral lessons, are interdicted at the theatre. There is 
something in the word Playhouse which seems so 
closely connected, in the minds of these people, with 
sin and Satan, — that it stands in their vocabulary for 
every species of abomination. And yet why? Where 
is every feeling more roused in favour of virtue than at 
a good play? Where is goodness so feelingly, so 
enthusiastically learnt ? What so solemn as to see 
the excellent passions of the human heart called forth 
by a great actor — animated by a great poet ? To hear 
Siddons repeat what Shakspeare wrote ! To behold 
the child and his mother — the noble and the poor arti- 
san — the monarch and his subjects — all ages and all 
ranks convulsed in one common passion — wrung with 
one common anguish, and, with loud sobs and cries, 
doing involuntary homage to the God that made their 
hearts ! What wretched infatuation to interdict such 
amusements as these ! What a blessing that man- 
kind can be allured from sensual gratification, and find 
relaxation and pleasure in such pursuits ! But the 
excellent Mr. Stanley is uniformly paltry and narrow, 
— always trembling at the idea of being entertained, 
and thinking no Christian safe who is not dull. As to 
the spectacles of impropriety which are sometimes 
witnessed in parts of the theatre, such reasons apply, 
in a much stronger degree, to not driving along the 
Strand, or any of the great public streets of London, 
after dark ; and, if the virtue of well-educated young 
persons is made of such very frail materials, their best 
resource is a nunnery at once. It is a very bad rule, 
however, never to quit the house for fear of catching 
cold. 

Mrs. More practically extends the same doctrine 
to cards and assemblies. No cards — because cards 
are employed in gaming ; no assemblies — because 
many dissipated persons pass their lives in assemblies. 
Carry this but a little further, and we must say, no 
wine — because of drunkenness ; no meat — because of 
gluttony ; no use, that- there may be no abuse ! The 
fact is, that Mr. Stanley wants, not only to be religi- 
ous, but to be at the head of the religious. These 
little abstinences are the cockades by which the party 
are known, — the rallying points for the evangelical 
faction. So natural is the love of power, that it some- 
times becomes the influencing motive with the sincere 
advocates of that blessed religion whose very charac- 
teristic excellence is the humility which it inculcates. 

We observe that Mrs. More, in one part of her 
work, falls into the common error about dress. She 
first blames ladies for exposing their persons in the 
present style of dress, and then says, if they knew 
their own interest, — if they were aware how much 
more alluring they were to men when their charms 
are less displayed, they would make the desired al- 
teration from motives merely selfish. 

« Oh ! if women in general knew what was their real in- 
terest, if they could guess with what a charm even the ap- 
pearance of modesty invests its posessor, they would dress 
decorously from mere self-love, if not from principle. The 
designing would assume modesty as an artifice; the co- 



50 



WORKS OF THE REV. SIDNEY SMITH. 



quette would adopt it as an allurement ; the pure as her ap- 
propriate attraction ; and the voluptuous as the most infal- 
lible art of seduction.'— (I. 189.) 

If there is any truth in this passage, nudity becomes 
a virtue ; and no decent woman, for the future, can be 
seen in garments. 

We have a few more of Mrs. More's opinions to 
notice. — It is not fair to attack the religion of the 
times, because, in large and indiscriminate parties, 
religion does not become the subject of conversation. 
Conversation must and ought to grow out of materials 
on which men can agree, not upon subjects which try 
the passions. But this good lady wants to see men 
chatting together upon the Pelagian heresy — to hear, 
in the afternoon, the theological rumours of the day— 
and to glean polemical tittle-tattle at a tea-table rout. 
All the disciples of this school uniformly fall into the 
same mistake. They are perpetually calling upon 
their votaries for religious thoughts and religious con- 
versation in every thing ; inviting them to ride, walk, 
row, wrestle, and dine out religiously ; — forgetting 
that the being to whom this impossible purity is re- 
commended, is a being compelled to scramble for his 
existence and support for ten hours out of the sixteen 
he is awake ;— forgetting that he must dig, beg, read, 
think, move, pay, receive, praise, scold, command, 
and obey ; — forgetting, also, that if men conversed as 
often upon religious subjects as they do upon the 
ordinary occurrences of the world, they would con- 
verse upon them with the same familiarity and want 
of respect, — that religion would then produce feelings 
not more solemn or exalted than any other topics 
which constitute at present the common furniture of 
human understandings. 

We are glad to find in this work some strong com- 
pliments to the efficacy of works, — some distinct ad- 
missions that it is necessary to be honest and just, be- 
fore we can be considered as religious. Such sort of 
concessions are very gratifying to us ; but how will 
they be received by the children of the Tabernacle ? 
It is quite clear, indeed, throughout the whole of the 
work, that an apologetical explanation of certain re- 
ligious opinions is intended ; and there is a consider- 
able abatement of that tone of insolence with which 
the improved Christians are apt to treat the bungling 
specimens of piety to be met with in the more ancient 
churches. 

So much for the extravagances of this lad)'". — With 
equal sincerity, and with greater pleasure, we bear 
testimony to her talents, her good sense, and her real 
piety. There occur every now and then, in her pro- 
ductions, very original, and very profound observa- 
tions. Her advice is very often characterized by the 
most amiable good sense, and conveyed hi the most 
brilliant and inviting style. If, instead of belonging 
to a trumpery faction, she had only watched over 
those great points of religion in which the hearts of 
every sect of Christians are interested, she would have 
been one of the most useful and valuable writers of 
her day. As it is, every man would wish his wife and 
his children to read Calebs ; — watching himself its 
effects ; — separating the piety from the puerility ; — 
and showing that it is very possible to be a good 
Christian, without degrading the human understandr 
ing to the trash and folly of Methodism. 



PROFESSIONAL EDUCATION. (Edinburgh Re- 
view, 1809.) 

Essays on Professional Education. By R. L. Edge- 
worth, Esq. F. R. S. &c. London. 1S09. 
There are two questions to be asked respecting 
every new publication. Is it worth borrowing ? and 
we would advise our readers to weigh diligently the 
importance of these interrogations, before they take 
any decided step as to this work of Mr. Edgeworth ; 
the more especially as the name carries with it con- 
siderable authority, and seems, in the estimation of 
the unwary, almost to include the idea of purchase. 
For our own part, we would rather decline giving a 
direct answer to these Questions ; and shall content 



ourselves for the present with making a few such slight 
observations as may enable the sagacious to conjec- 
ture what our direct answer would be were we com- 
pelled to be more explicit. 

One great and signal praise we think to be the emi- 
nent due of Mr. Edgeworth : in a canting age he doet 
not cant ; — at a period when hyprocrisy and fanatic- 
ism will ahnost certainly insure the success of any 
publication, he has constantly disdained to have re- 
course to any such arts ; — without evar having been 
accused of disloyalty or irreligion, he is not always 
harping upon Church and King, in order to catch at a 
little populaity, and sell his books ; — he is manly, in- 
dependent, liberal — and maintains enlightened opi- 
nions with discretion and honesty. There is also in 
this work of Mr. Edgeworth an agreeable diffusion of 
anecdote and example, such as a man acquires who 
reads with a view to talking or writing. With these 
merits, we cannot say that Mr. Edgeworth is either 
very new, very profound, or very apt to be right in 
his opinion. He is active, enterprising, and unpre- 
judiced ; but we have not been very much instructed 
by what he has written, or always satisfied that he 
has got to the bottom of his subject. 

On one subject, however, we cordially agree with 
this gentleman ; and return him our thanks for the 
courage with which he has combated the excessive 
abuse of classical learning in England. It is a sub- 
ject upon which we have long wished for an oppor- 
tunity of saying something ; and one which we con 
sider to be of the very highest importance. 

' The principal defect,' says Mr. Edgeworth, ' in the pres- 
ent system of our great schools is, that they devote too 
large a portion of time to Latin and Greek. It is true, that 
the attainment of classical literature is highly desirable ; but 
it should not, or rather it need not, he the exclusive object 
of boys during eight or nine years. 

'Much less time, judiciously managed, would give them 
an acquaintance with the classics sufficient for all useful 
purposes, and would make them as good scholars as gen- 
tlemen or professional men need to be. It is not requsite 
that every man should make Latin or Greek verses ; there- 
fore, a knowledge of prosody beyond the structure of hex- 
ameter and pentameter verses, is as worthless an acquisi- 
tion as any which folly or fashion has introduced amongst 
the higher classes of mankind. It must indeed be acknowl 
edged" that there are some rare exceptions ; but even party 
prejudice would allow, that the persons alluded to must 
have risen to eminence though they had never written sap- 
phics or iambics. Though preceptors, parents, and the pub- 
lic in general, may be convinced of the absurdity of mak- 
ing boys spend so much of life in learning what can be of 
no use to them ; such are the difficulties of making any 
change in the ancient rules of great establishments, that 
masters themselves, however reasonable, dare not, and can- 
not make sudden alterations. 

< The only remedies that can be suggested might be, per- 
haps, to take those boys, who are not intended for profes 
sions in which deep scholarship is necessary, away from 
school before they reach the highest classes, where prosody 
and Greek and Latin verses are" required. 

< In the college of Dublin, where an admirable course of 
instruction has been long established, where this course is 
superintended by men of acknowledged learning and abili- 
ties, and pursued by students of uncommon industry, such 
is the force of example, and such the fear of appearing in- 
ferior in trifles to English universities, that much pains 
have been lately taken "to introduce the practice of writing 
Greek and Latin verses, and much solicitude has been 
shown about the prosody of the learned languages, without 
any attention being paid to the prosody of our own. 

< Boarding-houses for the scholars at Eton and Westmin- 
ster, which are at present mere lodging houses, might be 
kept by private tutors, who might, during the hours when 
the boys were not in the public classes, assist them in ac- 
quiring general literature, or such knowledge as might be 
advantageous for their respective professions. 

' New schools, that are not restricted to any established 
routine, should give a fair trial to experiments in education 
which afford a rational prospect of success. If nothing can 
be altered in the old schools, leave them as they are. De- 
stroy nothing— injure none — but let the public try whether 
they cannot have something better. If the experiment do 
not succeed, the public will be convinced that they ought 
to acquiesce in the established methods of instruction, and 
parents will send their children to the ancient seminaries 
with increased confidence.'— (p. 47 — 49.) 

Wi are well aware that nothing very new can re- 
main to be said uuon a topic so often debated. The 



TOO MUCH LATIN AND GREEK. 



complaints we have to make are at least as old as the [ they inure children to intellectual difficulties, and 



time of Locke and Dr. Samuel Clarke ; and the evil 
which is the subject of these complaints has certainly 
rather increased than diminished since the period of 
those two great men. An hundred years, to be sure, 
is a very little time for the duration of a national error ; 
and it is so far from being reasonable to look for its 
decay at so short a date, that it can hardly be expect- 
ed, within such limits, to have displayed the full 
bloom of its imbecility. 

There are several feelings to which attention must 
be paid, before the question of classical learning can 
be fairly and temperately discussed. 

We are apt, in the first place, to remember the im- 
mense benefits which the study of the classics once 
conferred on mankind ; and to feel for those models 
on which the taste of Europe has been formed, some- 
thing like sentiments of gratitude and obligation. This 
is all well enough, so long as it continues to be a mere 
feeling ; but, as soon as it interferes with action, it 
nourishes dangerous prejudices about education. No- 
thing will do in the pursuit of knowledge but the 
blackest ingratitude ; the moment we have got up the 
ladder, we must ldck it down ;■ — as soon as we have 
passed over the bridge, we must let it rot ; — when we 
have got upon the shoulders of the ancients, we must 
look over their heads. The man who forgets the 
friends of his childhood in real life, is base : but he 
who clings to the props of his childhood in literature, 
must be content to remain as ignorant as he was when 
a child. His business is to forget, disown, and deny — 
to think himself above every thing which has been of 
use to him in time past — and to cultivate that exclu- 
sively from which he expects future advantage : in 
short, to do every thing for the advancement of his 
knowledge which it would be infamous to do for the 
advancement of his fortune If mankind still derive 
advantage from classical literature proportionate to 
the labour they bestow upon it, let their labour and 
their study proceed; but the moment we cease to read 
Latin and Greek for the solid utility we derive from 
them, it would be a very romantic application of 
human talents to do so from any feeling of gratitude, 
and recollection of past service. 

To almost every Englishman up to the age of three 
or four and twenty, classical learning has been the 
great object of existence ; and no man is very apt to 
suspect, or very much pleased to hear, that what he 
has done for so long a time was not worth doing. His 
classical literature, too. reminds every man of the 
scenes of his childhood, and brings to his fancy several 
of the most pleasing associations which we are capa- 
ble of forming.' A certain sort of vanity, also, very 
naturally grows among men occupied in a common 
pursuit. Classical quotations are the watch-words of 
scholars, by which they distinguish each other from 
the ignorant and illiterate ; and Greek and Latin are 
insensibly become almost the only test of a cultivated 
mind. 

Some men through indolence, others through ig- 
norance, and most through necessity, submit to the 
established education of the times ;• and seek for their 
children that species of distinction which happens, at 
the period in which they live, to be stamped with the 
approbation of mankind. This mere question of con- 
venience every parent must determine for himself. A 
poor man, who has his fortune to gain, must be a 
quibbling theologian, or a classical pedant, as fashion 
dictates ; and he must vary his error with the error 
of the times. But it would be much more fortunate 
for mankind, if the public opinion, which regulates the 
pursuits of individuals, were more wise and enlighten- 
ed than it at present is. 

All these considerations make it extremely difficult 
to procure a candid hearing on this question ; and to 
refer this branch of education to the only proper cri- 
terion of every branch of education — its utility in 
future life. 

There are two questions which grow out of this sub- 
ject : 1st, How far is any sort of classical education 
useful ? 2d, How far is that particular classical edu- 
cation adopted in this country useful ? 



make the life of a young student what it ought to be 
I a life of considerable labour. We do not, of course 
mean to confine this praise exclusively to the study 
of Latin and Greek ; or to suppose that other difrl 
culties might not be found which it would be useful to 
overcome : but though Latin and Greek have this 
merit in common with many arts and sciences, still 
they have it ; and, if they do nothing else, they at 
least secure a solid and vigorous application at a 
period of life which materially influences all other 
periods. 

To go through the grammar of one language 
thoroughly is of great use for the mastery of even; 
other grammar ; because there obtains, through ail 
languages, a certain analogy to each other in then 
grammatical construction. Latin and Greek have 
now mixed themselves etymologically with ail the 
languages of modern Europe — and with none more 
than our own ; so that it is necessary to read these 
two tongues for other objects than themselves. 

The two ancient languages are, as mere inventions 
— as pieces of mechanism, incomparably more beauti- 
ful than any of the modern languages of "Europe : their 
mode of signifying time and case by terminations, in- 
stead of auxiliary verbs and participles, would oi 
stamp their superiority. Add to this, the copiousness 
of the Greek language, with the fancy, majesty, and 
harmony of its compounds ; and there are quite suffi- 
cient reasons why the classics should be studied for 
beauties of language. Compared to them, merely as 
vehicles of thought and passion, all modern languages 
are dull, ill- contrived, and barbarous. 

That a great part of the Scriptures has come down 
to us in the Greek language, is of itself a reason, if 
ail others were wanting, why education should be 
planned so as to produce a supply of Greek scholars. 

The cultivation of style is very justty made a part 
of education. Every thing Avhich is written is meant 
either to please or to instruct. The second object it 
is difficult to effect, without attending to the first; 
and the cultivation of style is the acquisition of those 
rules and literary habits which sagacity anticipates, 
or experience shows to be the most effectual means 
of pleasing. Those works are the best which have 
longest stood the test of time, and pleased the greatest 
number of exercised minds. Whatever, therefore, cur 
conjectures may be, we cannot be so sure that the best 
modern writers can afford us as good models as the 
ancients ; — we cannot be certain that they will live 
through the revolutions of the world, and continue to 
please in every climate — under every species of go- 
vernment — through every stage of civilization.. The 
moderns have been well taught by their masters ; 
but the time is hardly yet come when the necessity 
for such instruction no longer exists. We may still 
borrow descriptive power from Tacitus ; dignified 
perspicuity from Livy ; simplicity from Caesar : and 
from Homer some portion of that light and heat which, 
dispersed into ten thousand channels, has filled the 
world with bright images and illustrious thoughts. 
Let the cultivator of modern literature addict himself 
to the purest models of taste which France, Italy, and 
England could supply, he might still learn from Virgil 
to be majestic, and from Tibullus to be tender ; he 
might not yet look upon the face of nature as Theocri- 
tus saw it ; nor might he reach those springs of pathos 
with which Euripides softened the hearts of his audi- 
ence. In short, it appears to us, that there are so 
many excellent reasons why a certain number of scho- 
lars shoidd he kept up in this and in every civilized 
country, that we should consider every system of edu- 
cation from which classical education was excluded, 
as radically erroneous and completely absurd. 

That vast advantages, then, may be derived from 
classical learning, there can !be uo doubt. The advan- 
tages which are dirived from classical learning by the 
English manner of teaching, involve another and a 
very different question ; and we will venture to say, 
that there never was a more complete instance in any 
country of such extravagant and overacted attachment 
to any branch of knowledge as that which obtains in 



Latin and Greek are in the first place, useful as I this country with regard to classical knowledge. A 



WORKS OF THE REV. SIDNEY SMITH. 



young Englishman goes to school at six or seven years 
old; and he remains in a course of education till 
twenty-three or twenty-four years of age. In all that 
time, his sole and exclusive occupation is learning Lat- 
in and Greek :* he has scarcely a notion that there is 
any other kind of excellence ; and the great system of 
facts with which he is most perfectly acquainted, are 
the intrigues of the Heathen gods: with whom Pan 
slept ? — with whom Jupiter ? — whom Apollo ravished ? 
These facts the English youth get by heart the mo- 
ment they leave the nursery ; and are most sedulously 
instructed in them till the best and most active part of 
life is passed away. Now, this long career of classi- 
cal learning, we may, if we please, denominate a foun- 
dation ; but it is a foundation so far above ground, that 
! is absolutely no room to put any thing upon it. 
i, you occupy a man with one thing till he is twenty- 
four years of age, you have exhausted all his leisure 
time : he is culled into the world, and compelled to 
act ; or is surrounded with pleasures, and thinks and 
reads no more. If you have neglected to put other 
things in him, they will never get in afterwards ; — if 
you have fed him only with words, he will remain a 
narrow and limited being to the end of his existence. 
The bias given to men's minds is so strong, that it 
is no uncommon thing to meet with Englishmen, whom, 
but for their grey hairs and wrinkles, we might easily 
mistake for schoolboys. Their*talk is of Latin verses ; 
and it is quite clear, if men's ages are to be dated from 
the state of their mental progress, that such men are 
eighteen years of age, and not a day older. Their 
minds have been so completely possessed by exagge- 
rated notions of classical learning, that they have not 
been able, in the general school of the world, to form 
any other notions of real greatness. Attend, too, to 
the public feelings— look to all the terms of applause. 
A learned man ! — a scholar ! — a man of erudition ! 
Upon whom are these epithets of approbation be- 
st 3 wed ? Are they given to men acquainted with the 
science of government ? thoroughly masters of the 
., : graphical and commercial relations of Europe ? to 
men who know the properties of bodies, and their ac- 
tion upon each other? No : this is not learning : it is 
chemistry, or political economy — not learning. The 
distinguishing abstract term, the epithet of Scholar, 
is reserved for him who writes on the CEolic reduplica- 
tion, and is familiar with the Sylburgian method of ar- 
ranging defectives in a> and pi. The picture which a 
young Englishman, addicted to the pursuit of knowl- 
edge, draws — his beau ideal, of human nature — his top 
and consummation of man's powers — is a knowledge 
of the Greek language. His object is not to reason, 
to imagine, or to invent ; but to conjugate, decline, 
and derive. The situations of imaginary glory which 
he draws for himself, are the detection of an anapaest 
in the wrong place, or the restoration of a dative case 
which Cranzius had passed over, and the never-dying 
Ernesti failed to observe. If a young classic of this 
kind were to meet the greatest chemist or the great- 
est mechanician, or the most profound political econ- 
mist of his time, in company with the greatest Greek 
scholar, would the slightest comparison between them 
ever come across his mind ? — would he ever dream 
that such men as Adam Smith and Lavoisier were 
equal in dignity of understanding to, or of the same 
utility as, Bentley and Heyne ? We are inclined to 
think, that the feeling excited would be a good deal 
like that which was expressed by Dr. George about the 
praises of the great King of Prussia, who entertained 
considerable doubts whether the king, with all his vic- 
tories, knew how to conjugate a Greek verb in pt . 

Another misfortune of classical learning, as taught 
in England, is, that scholars have come, in process of 
time, and from the effects of association, to love the 
instrument better than the end ;— not the luxury which 
fhe difficulty encloses, but the difficulty ;— not the fil- 
bert, but the shell); — not what may read in Greek, but 
Greek itself. It is not so much the man who has 



* Unless he goes to the University of Cambridge ; and then 
classics occupy him entirely for about ten years ; and divide 
him with mathematics for four or five more. 



mastered the wisdom of the ancients, that is valued, 
as he who displays his knowledge of the vehicle hi 
which that wisdom is conveyed. The glory is to show 
I am a scholar. The good sense and ingenuity I may 
gain by my acquaintance with ancient authors is mat- 
ter of opinion ; but if I bestow an immensity of pains 
upon a point of accent or quantity, this is something 
positive ; I establish my pretensions to the name of 
scholar, and gain the credit of learning, while I sacri- 
fice all its utility. 

Another evil in the present system of classical edu- 
cation is the extraordinary perfection which is aimed 
at in teaching those languages ; a needless perfection; 
an accuracy which is sought for in nothing else. There 
are few boys who remain to the age of eighteen or 
nineteen at a public school, without making above ten 
thousand Latin verses ; — a greater number than is con- 
tained in the JEneid : and after he has made this quan- 
tity of verses in a dead language, unless the poet 
should happen to be a very weak man indeed, he nev- 
er makes another as long as he lives. It may be urged, 
and it is urged, that this is of use in teaching the del- 
icacies ol the language. No doubt it is of use for this 
purpose, if we put out of view the immense time and 
trouble sacrificed in gaming these little delicacies. It 
would be of use that we should go on till fifty year? 
of age making Latin verses, if the price of a whole 
life were not too much to pay for it. We effect ous 
object ; but we do it at the price of something greater 
than our object. And whence comes it that the ex- 
penditure of life and labour is totally put out of the 
calculation, when Latin and Greek are to be attained? 
In every other occupation, the question is fairly stated 
between the attainment, and the time employed in the 
pursuit ; — but in classical learning, it seems to be suf- 
ficient if the least possible good is gained by the great- 
est possible exertion ; if the end is anything, and the 
means every thing. It is of some importance to speak 
and write French ; and innumerable delicacies would 
be gained by writing ten thousand French verses : but 
it makes no" part of our education to write French po- 
etry. It is of some importance that there should be 
good botanists ; but no botanist can repeat, by heart, 
the names of all the plants in the known world ; nor is 
any astronomer acquainted with the appellation and 
magnitude of every star in the map of the heavens. 
The only department of human knowledge in which 
there can be no excess, no arithmetic, no balance of 
profit and loss, is classical learning. 

The prodigious honour in which Latin verses are 
held at public schools, is surely the most absurd of all 
absurd distinctions. You rest all reputation upon that 
which is a natural gift, and which nolabour can attain. 
If a lad won't learn the words of a language, his degra- 
dation in the school is a very natural punishment for 
his disobedience, or his indolence ; but it would be as 
reasonable to expect that all boys should be witty or 
beautiful, as that they should be poets. In either 
case it would be to make an accidental, unattainable, 
and not a yery important gift of nature, the only, or 
principal test of merit. This is the reason why boys, 
who make a very considerable figure at school, so very 
often make no figure in the world ; and why other lads, 
who are passed over without notice, turn out to be 
valuable important men. The test established in the 
world is widely different from that established in a 
place which is presumed to be a preparation for the 
world ; and the head of a public school, who is a per- 
fect miracle to his contemporaries, finds himself 
shrink into absolute insignificance, because he has 
nothing else to command respect or regard, but a talent 
for fugitive poetry in a dead language. 

The present state of classical education cultivates 
the imagination a great deal too much, and other habits 
of mind a great deal too little ; and trains up many 
young men in a style of elegant imbecility, utterly 
unworthy of the talents with which nature has en- 
dowed them. It may be said there are profound inves- 
tigations, and subjects quite powerful enough for any 
understanding, to be met with in classical literature. 
So there are ; but no man likes to add the diffi- 
culties of a language to the difficulties of a subject; 
and to study metaphysics, morals, and politics in 



TOO MUCH LATIN AND GREEK. 



53 



Greek, when the Greek alone is study enough without 
them. In all foreign languages, the most popular 
works are works of imagination. Even in the French 
language, which we know so well, for one serious 
work which has any currency in this country, we have 
twenty which are mere works of imagination. This is 
still more true in classical literature; because what 
their poets and orators have left us, is of infinitely 
greater value than the remains of their philosophy ; 
for, as society advances, men think more accurately 
and deeply, and imagine more tamely; works of rea- 
soning advance, and works of fancy decay. So that 
the matter of fact is, that a classical scholar of twenty- 
three or twentjr.four years of age, is a man principally 
conversant with works of imagination. His feelings 
are quick, his fancy lively, and his taste good. Talents 
for speculation and original inquiry he has none ; nor 
has he formed the invaluable habit of pushing things 
up to their first principles, or of collecting dry and 
iinamusing facts as the elements of reasoning. All the 
solid and masculine parts of his understanding are left 
wholly without cultivation ; he hates the pain of think- 
ing, and suspects every man whose boldness and origi- 
nality call upon him to defend his opinions and prove 
his assertions. 

A very curious argument is sometimes employed in 
justification of the learned minutiae to which all young 
men are doomed, whatever be their propensities in 
future life. What are you to do with a young man up 
to the age of seventeen? Just as if there was such a 
want of difficulties to overcome, and of important 
tastes to inspire, that, from the mere necessity of 
doing something, and the impossibility of doing any 
thing else, you were driven to the expedient of metre 
and poetry ; — as if a young man within that period 
might not acquire the modern languages, modern his- 
tory, experimental philosophy, geography, chrono- 
logy, and a considerable share of mathematics ; — as 
if the memory of things was not more agreeable and 
more profitable than.th© memory of words. 

The great objection is, that we are not making the 
most of human life, when we constitute such an ex- 
tensive, and such minute classical erudition, an indis- 
pensable article in education. Up to a certain point 
we would educate every young man in Latin and 
Greek ; but to a point far short of that to which this 
species of education is now carried. Afterwards, we 
would grant to classical erudition as high honours as 
to every other department of knowledge, but not 
higher. We would place it upon a footing with many 
other objects of study ; but allow to it no superiority. 
Good scholars would be as certainly produced by these 
means as good chemists, astronomers, and mathema- 
ticians are now produced, without any direct provision 
whatsoever for their production. Why are we to trust 
to the diversity of human tastes, and the vareties of 
human ambition in every thing else, and distrust it 
in classics alone ? The passion for language is just as 
strong as any other literary passion. There are very 
good Persian and Arabic scholars in this country. 
Large heaps of trash have been dug up from Sanscrit 
ruins. We have seen, in our own times, a clergyman of 
the University of Oxford complimenting their majes- 
ties in Coptic and Syrophosnician verses ; and yet we 
doubt whether there will be a sufficient avidity in lite- 
rary men to get at the beauties of the finest writers 
which the world has yet seen ; and though the Bagvat 
Gheeta has (as can be proved) met with human beings 
to translate, and other human beings to read it, we 
think that, in order to secure an attention to Homer 
and Virgil, we must catch up every man — whether he 
is to be a clergyman or a duke — begin with him at six 
years of age, and never quit him till he is twenty ; 
making him conjugate and decline for life and death ; 
and so teaching him to estimate his progress in real 
wisdom as he can scan the verses of the Greek trage- 
dians. 

The English clergy, in whose hands education entirely 
rests, bring up the first younsp men of the country as if 
they were all*to keep grammar schools in little country 
towns ; and a nobleman, upon whose knowledge and 
liberality the honour and welfare of his country may 
depend, is diligently worried, for half his life, with 



the small pedantry of longs and shorts. There is a 
timid and absurd apprehension, on the part of ecclesi- 
astical tutors, of letting out the minds of youth upon 
difficult and important subjects. They fancy that 
mental exertion must end in religious scepticism ; and ; 
to preserve the principles of their pupils, they confine 
them to the safe and elegant imbecility of classical 
learning. A genuine Oxford tutor would shudder to 
hear his young men disputing upon moral and political 
truth, forming and pulling down theories, and indulging 
in all the boldness of youthful discussion. He would 
augur nothing from it but impiety to God and treason, 
to kings. And yet, who vilifies both more than the 
holy poltroon who carefully averts from them the 
searching eye of reason, and who knows no better me- 
thod of teaching the highest duties, than by extirpa- 
ting the finest qualities and habits of the mind ? If 
our religion is a fable, the sooner it is exploded the 
better. If our government is bad, it should be amend- 
ed. But we have no doubt of the truth of the one, or 
of the excellence of the other ; and are convinced that 
both will be placed on a firmer basis in proportion as 
the minds of men are more trained to the investigation 
of truth. At present, we act with the minds of our 
young men as the Dutch did with their exuberant 
spices. An infinite quantity of talent is annually de- 
stroyed in the universities of England by the miserable 
jealousy and littleness of ecclesiastical instructors. It 
is in vain to say we have produced great men under 
this system. We have produced great men under all 
systems. Every Englishman must pass half his life in 
learning Latin and Greek ; and classical learning is 
supposed to have produced the talents which it has 
not been able to extinguish. It is scarcely possible to 
prevent great men from rising up under any system ot 
education, however bad. Teach men demonology or 
astrology, and you will still have a certain portion of 
original genius, in spite of these or any other branches 
of ignorance and folly. 

There is a delusive sort of splendour in a vast body 
of men pursuing one object, and thoroughly obtaining 
it ; and yet, though it is very splendid, it is far from 
being useful. Classical literature is the great object 
at Oxford. Many minds so employed, have produced 
many works and much fame in that department ; but 
if all liberal arts and sciences useful to human life had 
been taught there — if some had dedicated themselves 
to chemistry, some to mathematics, some to experi- 
mental philosophy — and if every attainment had been 
honoured in the mixed ratio of its difficulty and utility, 
the system of such an University would have been 
much more valuable, but the splendour of its name 
something less. 

When an University has been doing useless things 
for a long time, it appears at first degrading to them 
to be useful. A set of lectures upon political economy 
would be discouraged in Oxford,* probably despised, 
probably not permitted. To discuss the inclosure of 
commons, and to dwell upon imports and exports — to 
come so near to common life, would seem to be undig- 
nified and contemptible. In the same manner, the 
Parr, or the Bentley of his day, would be scandalized 
in an University to be put on a level with the disco- 
verer of a neutral salt ; and yet, what other measure 
is there of dignity in intellectual labour, but usefulness 
and difficulty ? And what ought the term University 
to mean, but a place where every science is taught 
which is liberal, and at the same time useful to man- 
kind?' Nothing would so much tend to bring classical 
literature within proper bounds as a steady and inva- 
riable appeal to these tests in our appreciation of all 
human knowledge. The puffed up pedant would col- 
lapse into his proper size, and the maker of verses, 
and the rememberer of words would soon assume that 
station which is the lot of those, who go up unbidden 
to the upper places of the feast. 

We should be sorry if what we have said should 
appear too contemptuous towards classical learning, 
which we most sincerely hope will always be held in 
great honour in this country, though we certainly do 
not wish to it that exclusive honour which it at present 

* They have since been established. 



■A 



WORKS OF THE REV. SIDNEY SMITH. 



enjoys. A great classical scholar is an ornament, and 
an important acquisition to his country; but, in a place 
of education, we would give to all knowledge an equal 
chance for distinction ; and would trust to the varieties 
of human disposition that every science worth culti- 
vation would be cultivated. Looking always to real 
utility as our guide, we should see, with equal pleasure, 
a studious and inquisitive mind arranging the produc- 
tions of nature, investigating the qualities of bodies, or 
mustering the difficulties of the learned languages. 
We should not care whether he were chemist, natural- 
ist, or scholar ; because we know it to be as necessary 
that matter should be studied, and subdued to the use 
ii, as that taste should be gratified, and imagina- 
tion inflamed. 

In those who were destined for the church, we would 
undoubtedly encourage classical learning more than 
hi any other body of men ; but if we had to do with a 
3'oung man going out into public life, we would exhort 
him to contemn, or at least not to affect, the reputa- 
tion of a great scholar, but to educate himself for the 
offices of civil life. He should learn what the consti- 
tution of his country really was, how it had grown into 
its present state, the perils that had threatened it, the 
malignity that had attacked it, the courage that had 
Lt for it, and the wisdom that had made it great. 
We would bring strongly before his mind the charac- 
ters of those Englishmen who have been the steady 
friends of the public happiness ; and by their exam- 
ples, would breathe into him a pure public taste which 
would keep him untainted in all the vicissitudes of 
political fortune. We would teach him to burst through 
the well-paid, and the pernicious cant of indiscriminate 
loyalty ; and to know his sovereign only as he dis- 
charged those duties, and displayed those qualities, 
for which the blood and the treasure of his people are 
confided to his hands. We should deem it of the ut- 
mos: importance that his attention was directed to the 
true principles of legislation — what effect laws can 
produce upon opinions, and opinions upon laws — what 
subjects are fit for legislative interference, and, when 
men may be left to the management of their own in- 
terests. The mischief occasioned by bad laws, and 
the perplexity which arises from numerous laws — the 
causes of national wealth — the relations of foreign 
trade — the encouragement of manufactures and agri- 
culture — the fictitious wealth occasioned by paper 
credit — the laws of population — the management of 
poverty and mendicity — the use and abuse of monopo- 
ly — the theory of taxation — the consequences of the 
public debt. These are some of the subjects, and some 
of the branches of civil education to which we would 
turn the minds of future judges, future senators, and 
future noblemen, After the first period of life had 
been given up to the cultivation of the classics, and the 
reasoning powers were now beginning to evolve them- 
selves, these are some of the propensities in study 
which we would endeavour to inspire. Great know- 
ledge, at such a period of life, we could not convey ; 
nut we might fix a decided taste for its acquisition, 
and a strong disposition to respect it in others. The 
formation of some great scholars we should certainly 
prevent, and hinder many from learning what, in a few / 
years, they would necessarily forget ; but this loss 
would be well repaid — if we could show the future ru- 
lers of the country that thought and labour which it 
requires to make a nation happy, or if we could inspire 
them with that love of public virtue, which, after reli- 
gion, we most solemnly believe to be the brightest or- 
nament of the mind of man. 



FEMALE EDUCATION. (Edinburgh Review, 
1810.) 

Advice to Young Ladies on the Improvement of the Mind. By 
Thomas Broadhurst. 8vo. London, 1808. 

Mr. Broadhurst is a very good sort of a man, who 
has not written a very bad book, upon a very important 
subject, His object (a very laudable one) is to re- 
commend a better system of female education than at 
preseut prevails in this country— to turn the attention 



of women from the trifling pursuits to which they are 
now condemned — and to cultivate faculties which,, un- 
der the actual system of management, might almost 
as well not exist. To the examination of his ideas 
upon these points, we shall very cheerfully give up a. 
portion of our time and attention. 

A great deal has been said of the original difference 
of capacity between men and women ; as if women 
were more quick, and men more judicious ; as if wo- 
men were more remarkable for delicacy of associa- 
tion, and men for stronger powers of attention. All 
this, we confess, appears to us very fanciful. That 
there is a difference in the understandings of the men 
and the women we every day meet with, every body, 
we suppose, must perceive ; but there is none* surely 
which may not be accounted for by the difference of 
circumstances in which they have been placed, with- 
out referring to any conjectural difference of original 
conformation of mind. As long as boys and girls run 
about in the dirt, and trundle hoops together, they are 
both precisely alike. If you catch up one half of these 
creatures, and train them to a particidar set of actions 
and opinions, and the other half to a perfectly oppo- 
site set, of course their understandings will differ, as 
one or the other sort of occupations has called this or 
that talent into action. There is surely no occasion to 
go into any deeper or more abstruse reasoning, in or- 
der to explain so very simple a phenomenon. Taking 
it, then, for granted, that nature has been as bountiful 
of understanding to one sex as the other, it is incum- 
bent on us to consider what are the principal objec- 
tions commonly made against the communication of a 
greater share of knowledge to women than commonly 
falls to their lot at present : for though it may be 
doubted whether women should learn all that men 
learn, the immense disparity which now exists be- 
tween their knowledge we would hardly think could 
admit of any rational defence. It is not easy to ima- 
gine that there can be any just cause why a woman of 
forty should be more ignorant than a boy of twelve 
years of age. If there be any good at all in female ig- 
norance, this (to use a very colloquial phrase) is sure- 
ly too much of" a good thing. 

Something in this question must depend, no doubt, 
upon the leisure which either sex enjoys for the culti- 
vation of their understandings :, — and we cannot help 
thinking, that women have fully as much, if not more 
idle time upon their hands than men. Women are ex- 
cluded from all the serious business of the world ; men 
are lawyers physicians, clergymen, apothecaries, and 
justices of the peace — sources of exertion which con- 
sume a great deal more time than producing and suck- 
ling children ; so that, if the thing is a thing that 
ought to be done — if the attainments of literature are 
objects really worthy the attention of females, they 
cannot plead the want of leisure as an excuse for indo- 
lence and neglect. The lawyer, who passes his day in 
exasperating the bickerings of Roe and Doe, is certain- 
ly as much engaged as his lady who has the whole of 
the morning before her to correct the children and pay 
the bills. The apothecary, who rushes from an act 
of phlebotomy in the western parts of the town to in- 
sinuate a bolus in the east, is surely as completely ab- 
sorbed as that fortunate female, who is darning the 
garment, or preparing the repast of her iEsculapius at 
home ; and in every degree and situation in life, it 
seems that men must necessarily be expo-ed to more 
serious demands upon their time and attention than can 
possibly be the case with respect to the other sex. We 
are speaking always of the fair demands which ought 
to be made upon the time and attention of women ; for, 
as the matter now stands, the time of women is con- 
sidered as worth nothing at all. Daughters are kept 
to occupations in sewing, patching mantua-making, 
and mending, by which it is impossible they can earn 
tenpence a day. The intellectual improvement of wo- 
men is considered to be of such subordinate impor- 
tance, that twenty pounds paid for needle-work would 
give to a whole family fthure to acquire a fund of real 
knowledge. They are kept with nimble fingers and 
vacant understandings,till the season of improvement 
is utterly passed away, and all chance of forming 
more important habits completely lest. We do no 



FEMALE EDJCATION. 



5* 



therefore say that women have more leisure than 
men, if it be necessary that they should lead the life 
of artisans ; but we make this assertion only upon the 
supposition, that it is of some importance women 
should be instructed ; and that many ordinary occupa- 
tions for which a little money will find a better substi- 
tute, should be sacrificed to this consideration. 

We bar in this discussion, any objection which pro- 
ceeds from thetnere novelty of teaching women more 
than they are already taught. It may be useless that 
their education should be improved, or it may be per- 
nicious ; and these are the fair grounds on which the 
question may be argued. But those who cannot bring 
their minds to consider such an unusual extension of 
knowledge, without connecting with it some sensation 
of the ludicrous, should remember that, in the progress 
from absolute ignorance, there is a period when culti- 
vation of mind is new to every rank and description of 
persons. A century ago, who would have believed 
that country gentlemen could be brought to read and 
spell with the ease and accuracy which we now fre- 
quently remark, or supposed that they could be carried 
even to the elements of ancient and modern history? 
Nothing is more common or more stupid, than to take 
the actual for the possible^ — to believe that all which is, 
is all which can be ; first, to laugh at every proposed 
deviation from practice as impossible — then, when it 
is carried into effect, to be astonished that it did not 
take place before. 

It is said, that the effect of knowledge is to make 
women pedantic and affected ; and that nothing can 
"be more offensive than to see a woman stepping out of 
the natural modesty of her sex to make an ostentatious 
display of her literary attainments. This may be true 
enough ; but the answer is so trite and obvious, that 
we are ..almost ashamed to make it. All affectation 
and display proceed from the supposition of possessing 
something better than the rest of the world possesses. 
Nobody is vain of possessing two legs and two arms ; 
— because that is the precise quantity of either sort of 
limb which every body possesses. Who ever heard a 
lady boast that she understood French? — for no other 
reason, that we know of, but because every body in 
these days does understand French ; and though there 
may be some disgrace in being ignorant of that lan- 
guage, there is little or no merit in its acquisition. Dif- 
fuse knowledge generally among women, and you will 
at once cure the conceit which knowledge occasions 
while it is rare. Vanity and conceit we shall of course 
witness in men and women ..as long as the world en- 
dures : but by multiplying the attainments upon which 
these feelings are founded, you increase the difficulty 
of indulging them, and render them much more toler- 
able, by making them the proofs of much higher merit. 
When learning ceases to be uncommon among women, 
learned women will cease to be affected. 

A great many of the lesser and more obscure duties 
of life necessarily devolve upon the female sex. The 
arrangement of all household matters, and the care of 
children in their early infancy, must of course depend 
upon them. Now, there is a very general notion, that 
the moment you put the education of women upon a 
better footing than it is at present, at that moment 
there will be an end of all domestic economy ; and that 
if you once suffer women to eat of the tree of know- 
ledge, the rest of the family will very soon be reduced 
to the same kind of aerial and unsatisfactory diet. 
These, and all such opinions, are referable to one great 
and common cause of error ; — that man does every- 
thing, and that nature does nothing ; and that every- 
thing we see is referable to positive institution rather 
than to original feeling. Can anything, for example, 
ie more perfectly absurd than to suppose that the care 
and perpetual solicitude which a mother feels for her 
children, depends upon her ignorance of Greek and 
mathematics ; and that she would desert an infant for 
a quadratic equation ? We seem to imagine that we 
caiv break in pieces the solemn institution of nature, 
by the little laws of a boarding-school ; and that the 
existence of the human race depends upon teaching 
women a little more, or a little less ; — that Cimmerian 
giorance can aid paternal affection, cr the circle of 
iffts and sciences produce its destruction. In the same 



manner, we forget the principles upon which the love 
of order, arrangement, and all the arts of economy 
depend. They depend not upon ignorance nor idle- 
ness, but upon the poverty, confusion, and ruin which 
would ensue from neglecting them. Add to these prin- 
ciples, the love of what is beautiful and magnificent, 
and the vanity of display : — and there can surely be no 
reasonable doubt but that the order and economy of 
private life is amply secured from the perilous inroads 
of knowledge. 

We would fain know, too, if knowledge is to pro- 
duce such baneful effects upon the material and the 
household virtues, why this influence has not already 
been felt ? Women are much better educated now 
than they were a century ago ; but they are by no 
means less remarkable for attention to the arrange- 
ment of their household, or less inclined to discharge 
the offices of parental affection It would be very 
easy to show that the same objection has been made 
at all times to every improvement in the education of 
both sexes and all ranks — and been as uniformly and 
completely refuted by experience . A great part of the 
objections made to the education of women, are ra 
ther objections made to human nature than to the fe 
male sex : for it is surely true that knowledge, where 
it produces any bad effects at all, does as much mis- 
chief to one sex as to the other, — and gives birth to 
fully as much arrogance, inattention to common 
affairs, and eccentricity, among men, as it does among 
women. But i t by no means follows that you get rid of 
vanity and self-conceit, because you get rid of learn- 
ing. Self-complacency can never want an excuse ; 
and the best way to make it more tolerable, and more 
useful, is to give to it as high and as dignified an ob- 
ject as possible. But, at all events, it is unfair to 
bring forward against a part of the world an objection 
which is equally powerful against the whole. When 
foolish women think they have any distinction, they 
are apt to be proud of it ; so are foolish men. But we 
appeal to any one who has lived with cultivated per- 
sons of either sex, whether he has not witnessed as 
much pedantry, as much wrongheadedness, as much 
arrogance, and certainly a great deal more rudeness, 
produced by learning in men, than in women 5 there- 
fore, we should make the accusation general — or dis- 
miss it altogether ; though, with respect to pedantry, 
the learned are certainly a little unfortunate, that so 
very emphatic a word, which is occasionally applied 
to all men embarked eagerly in any pursuit, should be 
reserved exclusively for them : for, as pedantry is an 
ostentatious obtrusion of knowledge, in which those 
who hear us cannot sympathize, it is a fault of which 
soldiers, sailors, sportsmen, gamesters, cultivators, 
and all men engaged in a particular occupation, are 
quite as guilty as scholars ; but they have the good 
fortune to have the vice only of pedantry, — while scho- 
lars have both the vice and"the name of it too. 

Some persons are apt to contrast the acquisition of 
important knowledge with what they call simple plea- 
sures ; and deem it more becoming that a woman 
should educate flowers, make friendships with birds, 
and pick up plants, than enter into more difficult and 
fatiguing studies. If a woman has no taste and genius 
for higher occupations, let her engage in these, to be 
sure, rather than remain destitute of any pursuit. But 
why are we necessarily to doom a girl, whatever be 
her taste or her capacity, to one unvaried line of pet- 
ty and frivolous occupation ? If she is full of strong 
sense and elevated curiosity, can there be any reason 
why she should be diluted and enfeebled down to a 
mere culler of simples, and fancier of birds? — why- 
books of history and reasoning are to be torn out of 
her hands, and why she is to be sent, like a butterfly, 
to hover over the idle flowers of the field ? Such 
amusements are innocent to those whom they can 
occupy ; but they are not innocent to those who have 
too powerful understandings to be occupied by them 
Light broths and fruits are innocent food only to weak 
or to infant stomachs ; but they are poison to that 
organ in its perfect and mature state. But the great 
charm seems to be in the word simplicity— simple 
pleasures ! If by a simple pleasure is meant an inno- 
cent pleasure, the observation is best answered by 



56 



WORKS OF THE REV. SIDNEY SMITH. 



showing, that the pleasure which results from the 
acquisition of important knowledge is quite as inno- 
cent as any pleasure whatever: but if by a simple 
pleasure is meant one, the cause of which can be easily 
analyzed, or which does not last long, or which in 
itself i§ very faint, then simple pleasures seem to be 
very nearly synonymous with small pleasures ; and if 
the simplicity were to be a little increased, the plea- 
sure would vanish altogether. 

As it is impossible that every man should have 
industry or activity sufficiently to avail himself of the 
advantages of education, it is natural that men who 
are ignorant themselves, should view, with some de- 
gree of jealousy and alarm any proposal for improving 
the education of women. But such men may depend 
upon it, however the system of female education may 
be exalted, that there will never be wanting a due pro- 
portion of failures ; and that after parents, guardians, 
and preceptors have done all in their power to make 
everybody wise, there will be a plentiful supply of 
women who have taken special care to remain other- 
wise ; and they may rest assured, if the utter extinc- 
tion of ignorance and folly is the evil they dread, that 
their intere'sts will always be eifectualiy protected, in 
spite of every exertion to the contrary. 

We must in candour allow that those women who 
begin will have something more to overcome than 
may probably hereafter be the case. We cannot deny 
the jealousy which exists among pompous and foolish 
men respecting the education of women. There is a 
class of pedants who would be cut short in the estima- 
tion of the world a whole cubit if it were generally 
known that a young lady of eighteen could be taught 
to decline the tenses of the middle voice, or acquaint 
herself with the iEolic varieties of that celebrated 
language. Then women have, of course, all ignorant 
men for enemies to their instruction, who being bound 
(as they think) , iri* point of sex, to know more, are not 
well pleased, in point of fact, to know less. But, among 
men of sense and liberal politeness, a woman who has 
succesfully cultivated her mind, without diminishing 
the gentleness and propriety of her manners, is always 
sure to meet with a respect and attention bordering 
upon enthusiasm. 

There is in either sex a strong and permanent dis- 
position to appear agreeable to the other; and this is 
the fair answer to those who are fond of supposing, 
that an higher degree of knowledge would make wo- 
men rather the rivals than the companions of men. 
Presupposing such a desire to please, it seems much 
more probable, that a common pursuit should be a 
fresh source of interest, than a cause of contention. 
Indeed, to suppose that any mode of education can 
create a general jealousy and rivalry between the sex- 
es, is so very ridiculous, that it requires only to be 
stated in order to be refuted. The same desire of 
pleasing secures all that delicacy and reserve which 
are of such inestimable value to women. We are 
quite astonished, in hearing men converse on such 
subjects, to find them attributing such beautiful ef- 
fects to ignorance. It would appear, from the tenour 
of such objections, that ignorance had been the great 
civilizer of the world. Women are delicate and refi- 
ned, only because they are ignorant ; — they manage 
their household, only because they are ignorant ; — 
they attend to their children, only because they know 
no better. Now, we must reaUy confess, Ave have all 
our lives been so ignorant as not to know the value of 
ignorance. We have always attributed the modesty 
and refined manners of women, to their being well 
taught in moral and religious duty, — to the hazardous 
situation in which they are placed,— to that perpetual 
vigilance which it is their duty to exercise over 
thought, and word, and action,— and to that cultiva- 
tion of the mild virtues, which those who cultivate the 
stern and magnanimous virtues expect at their hands. 
After all, let it be remembered, Ave are not saying 
there are no objections to the diffusion of knowledge 
among the female sex. We Avouid not hazard such a 
proposition respecting any thing; but Ave are saying. 
that, upon the Avhole, it is the best method of employ- 
ing time ; and that there arc fcAver objections to it 
than to any other method. There are, perhaps, 50,000 
females in Great Britain who are exempted by circum- 



stances from all necessary labour : but every numan 
being must do something with their existence ; and 
the pursuit of knowledge is upon the whole, the most 
innocent, the most dignified, and the most useful me- 
thod of filling up that idleness, of which there is al- 
ways so large a portion in nations far advanced in 
civilization. Let any man reflect, too, upon the soli- 
tary situation in which Avomen are placed, — the ill 
treatment to which they are sometimes exposed, and 
which they must endure in silence, and without the 
power of complaining, — and he must feel convinced 
that the happiness of a woman will be materially in- 
creased in proportion as education has given her the 
habit and the means of draAving her resources from 
herself. 

There are a few common phrases in circulation, re- 
specting the duties of women, to Avhich we Avish to 
pay some degree of attention, because they are rather 
inimical to those opinions which we have advanced on 
this subject. Indeed, independently of this, there is 
nothing Avhich requires more vigilance than the cur- 
rent phrases of the day, of which there are always 
some resorted to in every dispute, and from the sove- 
reign authority of which it is often vain to make any 
appeal. t The true theatre for a woman is the sick- 
chamber ;' — f Nothing so honourable to a woman as 
not to be spoken of at all.' These tAvo phrases, the 
delight of Noodledom, are groAvn into common-places 
upon the subject ; and are not unfrequently employed 
to extinguish that love of knowledge in Avomen, Avhich, 
in our humble opinion, it is of o much' importance to 
cherish. Nothing, certainly, is so ornamental and 
delightful in Avomen as the benevolent affections ; but 
time cannot be filled up. and life employed, with high 
and impassioned A'irtues. Some of these feelings are 
of rare occurrence — all of short duration — or nature 
would sink under them. A scene of distress and 
anguish is an occasion Avhere the finest qualities of 
the female mind may be displayed ; but it is a mon- 
strous exaggeration to tell women that they are born 
only for scenes of distress and anguish. Nurse father, 
mother, sister, and brother, if they Avant it ; — it Avouid 
be a violation of the plainest duties to neglect them 
But, Avhen we are talking of the common occupations 
of life, do not let us mistake the accidents for the oc- 
cupations; — AAiien Ave are arguing how the twenty. 
three hours of the day are to be fiUed up, it is idle to 
tell us of those feelings and agitations above the level 
of common existence, which may employ the remain- 
ing hour. Compassion, and every other virtue, are 
the great objects Ave all ought to have in view ; but no 
man (and no woman) can fill up the twenty-four hours 
by acts of virtue. But one is a lawyer, and the other 
a ploughman, and the third a merchant ; and then, 
acts of goodness and intervals of compassion, and fine 
feeling, are scattered up and down the common occu- 
pations of life. We knoAv women are to be compas- 
sionate ; but they cannot be compassionate from eight 
o'clock in the morning till twelve at night : — and Avhat 
are they to do in the interval ? This is the only ques- 
tion Ave have been putting all along, and is all that can 
be meant by literary education. 

Then, again, as to the notoriety Avhich is incurred 
by literature. — The cultivation of 'knowledge is a very 
distinct thing from its publication ; nor does it follow 
that a woman is to become an author merely because 
she has talent enough for it. We do not wish a lady 
to Avrite books, — to defend and reply, — to squabble 
about the tomb of Achilles, or the plain of Troy, — any 
more than we Avish her to dance at the opera . to play 
at a public concert, or to put pictures in the exhibition, 
because she has learned music, dancing, and drawing. 
The great use of her knowledge will be that it contri- 
butes to her private happiness. She may make it 
public : but it is not the principal object which the 
friends of female education have in view. Among 
men, the feAv who write bear no comparison to the 
many Avho read. We hear most of the former, in- 
deed, because they are, in general, the most ostenta- 
tious part of literary men ; but there are innumerable 
persons A\iio, without ever laying themselves before 
the public, have made use of literature to add to the 
strength of their understandings, and to improve the 
happiness of their lives. After all,, it may be an evil 



FEMALE EDUCATION. 



57 



for ladies to be talked of: but we really think those 
ladies who are talked of only as Mrs. Marcet, Mrs. 
Somerville, and Miss Martineau are talked of, may 
bear their misfortunes with a very great degree of 
Christian patience. 

Their exemption from all the necessary business of 
life is one of the most powerful motives for the im- 
provement of education in women. Lawyers and 
physicians have in their professions a constant motive 
to exertion ; if you neglect their education, they must 
in a certain degree educate themselves by their com- 
merce with the world : they must learn caution, ac- 
auracy, and judgment, because they must incur re- 
sponsibility. But if you neglect to educate the mind 
of a woman, by the speculative difficulties which 
occur in literature, it can never be educated at all : if 
you do not effectually rouse it by education, it must 
remain for ever languid. Uneducated men may escape 
intellectual degradation ; uneducated women cannot. 
They have nothing to do ; and if they come untaught 
from the schools of education, they will never be in- 
structed in the school of events. 

Women have not their livelihood to gain by know- 
ledge ; and that is one motive for relaxing all those 
efforts which are made in the education of men. They 
certainly have not ; but they have happiness to gain, 
to which knowledge leads as probably as it does to 
profit ; and that is a reason against mistaken indul- 
gence. Besides, we conceive the labour and fatigue 
of accomplishments to be quite equal to the labour and 
fatigue of knowledge ; and that it takes quite as many 
years to be charming as it does to be learned. 

Another difference of the sexes is, that women are 
attended to, and men attend All acts of courtesy 
and politeness originate from the one sex, and are 
received by the other. We can see no sort of reason, 
in this diversity of condition, for giving to women a 
trifling and insignificant education ; but we see in it 
a very powerful reason for strengthening their judg- 
ment, and inspiring them with the habit of employing 
time usefully. We admit many striking differences 
in the situation of the two sexes, and many striking 
differences of understanding, proceeding from the dif- 
ferent circumstances in which they are placed : but 
there is not a single difference of this kind which does 
Dot afford a new argument for making the education of 
women better than it is. They have nothing serious 
to do ; — is that a reason why they should be brought 
up to do nothing but what is trifling ? They are ex- 
posed to great dangers ; — is that a reason why their 
faculties are to be purposely and industriously weak- 
ened? They are to form the characters of future 
men ; — is that a cause why their own characters are 
to be broken and flittered down as they now are ? In 
short, there is not a single trait in that diversity of 
circumstances, in which the two sexes are placed, that 
does not decidedly prove the magnitude of the error 
we commit in neglecting (as we do neglect) the edu- 
cation of women. 

If the objections against the better education of wo- 
men could be overruled, one of the great advantages 
that would ensue would be the extinction of innumera- 
ble follies. A decided and prevailing taste for one or 
another mode of education there must be. A century 
past, it was for housewifery — now it is for accomplish- 
ments. The object now is, to make women artists, — 
to give them an excellence in drawing, music, paint- 
ing, and dancing, — of which, persons who make these 
pursuits the occupation of their lives, and derive from 
them their subsistence, need not be ashamed. Now, 
one great evil of all this is, that it does not last. If 
the whole of life were an Olympic game, — if we could 
go on feasting and dancing to the end, — this might do ; 
but it is in truth merely a provision for the little inter- 
val between coming into life, and settling in it ; while 
it leaves a long and dreary expanse behind, devoid 
both of dignity and cheerfulness. No mother, no wo- 
man who has passed over the few first years of life, 
sings, or dances, or draws, or plays upon musical in- 
struments ! These are merely means for displaying 
the grace and vivacity of youth, which every woman 
gives up, as she gives up the dress and the manners 
eighteen ; she has no wish to retain them ; or, if she \ 



has, she is driven out of them by diameter and deri- 
sion. The system of female education, as it now 
stands, aims only at embellishing a few years of life, 
which are in themselves so full of grace and happiness, 
that they hardly want it ; and then leaves the rest of 
existence a miserable prey to idle insignificance. No 
woman of understanding and reflection can possibly 
conceive she is doing justice to her children by sucn 
kind of education. The object is, to give to children 
resources that will endure as long as life endures, — 
habits that time will ameliorate, not destroy, — occu- 
pations that will render sickness tolerable, solitude 
pleasant, age venerable, life more dignified and useful, 
and therefore death less terrible : and tbe compensa- 
tion which is offered for the ommission of all this, is a 
pshort-lived blaze, — a little temporary effect, which has 
no other consequence than to deprive the remainder 
of life of all taste and relish. There may be women 
who have a taste for the fine arts, and who evince a 
decided talent for drawing, or tor music. In that 
case, there can be no objection to the cultivation of 
these arts ; but the error is, to make such things the 
grand and universal object, — to insist upon it that 
every woman is to sing, and draw, and dance — with 
nature, or against nature, — to bind her apprentice to 
some accomplishment, and if she cannot succeed in 
oil or water-colours, to prefer gilding, varnishing, bur- 
nishing, box-making, to real solid improvement in taste, 
knowledge, and understanding. 

A great deal is said in favour of the social nature 
of the fine arts. Music gives pleasure to others. 
Drawing is an art, the amusement of which does not 
centre in him who exercises it, but is diffused among 
the rest of the world. This is true ; but there is no- 
thing, after all, so social as a cultivated mind. We 
do not mean to speak slightingly of the fine arts, or 
to depreciate the good humour with which they are 
sometimes exhibited ; but we appeal to any man, whe- 
ther a little spirited and sensible conversation — dis- 
playing, modestly, useful acquirements — and evincing 
rational curiosity, is not well worth the highest exer- 
tions of musical or graphical skill. A woman of 
accomplishments may entertain those who have 
the pleasure of knowing her for half an hour with 
great brilliancy ; but a mind full of ideas, and with 
that elastic spring which the love of knowledge only 
can convey, is a perpetual source of exhilaration and 
amusement to all that come within its reach; — not 
collecting its force into single and insulated achieve- 
ments, like the effort made in the fine arts — but dif- 
fusing, equally over the whole of existence, a calm 
pleasure — better loved as it is longer felt — and suit- 
able to every variety and every period of life. There- 
fore, instead of hanging the understanding of a woman 
upon walls, or hearing it vibrate upon strings, — in- 
stead of seeing it hi clouds, or hearing it in the wind, 
we would make it the first spring and ornament of 
society, by enriching it with attainments upon which 
alone such power depends. 

If the education of women were improved, the edu- 
cation of men would be improved also. Let any one 
consider (in order to bring the matter more home by 
an individual instance) of what immense importance 
to society it is, whether a nobleman of first-rate for- 
tune and distinction is well or ill brought up ; — what 
a taste and fashion he may inspire for private and for 
political vice ! — and what misery and mischief he may 
produce to the thousand human beings who are de- 
pendent on him ! A country contains no such curse 
within its bosom. Youth, wealth, high rank, and 
vice, form a combination which baffles all remon- 
strance and beats down all opposition. A man of high 
rank who combines these qualifications for corruption, 
is almost the master of the manners of the age, and 
has the public happiness within his grasp. But the 
most beautiful possession which a country can have 
is a noble and rich man, who loves virtue and know- 
ledge ; — who without being feeble or fanatical is pious 
— and who without being factious is firm and inde 
pendent ; — who, in his political life, is an equitable 
mediator between king and people ; and, in his civil 
life, a firm promoter of all which can shed a lustre 
upon his country, or promote the peace and order of 



WORKS OF THE REV. SIDNEY SMITH 



the world. But if these objects are of the importance 
■which we attribute to them, the education of women 
must i i important, as the formation of character for 
the first seven or eight years of life seems to depend 
almost entirely upon them. It is certainly in the 
power of a sensible and well-educated mother to in- 
spire ;: thin that period, such tastes and propensities 
as shall nearly decide the destiny of the future man ; 
and this is done, not only by the intentional exertions 
of the .nother, but by the gradual and insensible imi- 
tation of the child ; for there is something extremely 
contagious in greatness and rectitude of thinking, even 
at that, age; and the character of the mother with 
whom I e passes his early infancy, is always an event 
of the utmost importance to the child. A merely ac- 
complished woman cannot infuse her tastes into the 
minds of her sons; and, if she could, nothing could 
be more unfortunate than her success. Besides, when 
her accomplishments are given up, she has nothing 
left for it but to amuse herself in the best way she 
can; and, becoming entirely frivolous, either declines 
altogether the fatigues of attending to her children, 
or, attending to them, has neither talents nor know- 
ledge to succeed; and therefore, here is a plain and 
fair answer to those who ask so triumphantly, why 
should a woman dedicate herself to this branch of 
knowledge? ■_! why should she be attached to such 
science ? — Because, by having gained information on 
these point*- she may inspire her son with valuable 
tastes, whie jnay abide by him through life, and car- 
ry him up tt all the sublimities of knowledge ; — be- 
cause she c _^not lay the foundation of a great charac- 
ter, if she ' . absorbed in frivolous amusements, nor 
inspire her child with noble desires, when a long 
course of trifling has destroyed the little talents which 
were left by a bad education. 

It is of great importance to a country, that there 
should be as many understandings as possible active- 
ly emp! >yed within it. Mankind are much happier for 
the discovery of barometers, thermometers, steam-en- 
gines, and all the innumerable inventions in the arts 
and sciences. We are every day and every hour reap- 
ing the benefit of such talent and ingenuity. The 
same observation is true of such works as those of 
Drydei Pope, Milton, and Shakspeare. Mankind are 
much happier that such individuals have lived and 
written ; they add every day to the stock of public 
enjoyment — and perpetually gladden and embellish 
life. Now, the number of those who exercise their 
underst i. tidings to any good purpose, is exactly in 
proport on to those who exercise it at all; but, as the 
matter stands at present, half the talent in the uni- 
verse runs to waste, and is totally unprofitable. It 
would hive been almost as well for the world, hither- 
to, that women, instead of possessing the capacities 
they do at present, should have been born wholly 
destitute of wit, genius, and every other attribute of 
mind, of which men make so eminent an use : and the 
ideas of use and possession are so united together, 
that, because it has been the custom in almost all 
countries to give to women a different and a worse 
educatlnri than to men, the notion has obtained that 
they d( not possess faculties which they do not culti- 
vate. Just as, in breaking up a common, it is some- 
times very difficult to make the poor believe it will 
carry corn, merely because they have been hitherto 
accustomed to see it produce nothing but weeds and 
grass — ihey very naturally mistake present condition 
for general nature. So completely have the talents 
of women been kept down, that there is scarcely a 
single work, either of reason or imagination, written 
by a woman, which is in general circulation either in 
the English, French, or Italian literature ; — scarcely 
one that has crept even into the ranks of our minor 
poets. 

If the possession of excellent talents is not a con- 
clusive reason why they should be improved, it at 
least amounts to a very strong presumption ; and, if 
it can be shown that Avomen may be trained to reason 
and imagine as well as man, the strongest reasons are 
certainly necessary to show us why we should not 
avail ourselves of such rich gifts of nature; and we 
have a right to call for the clear statement of those 



perils which make it necessary that such talent? 
should be totaUy extinguished, or, at most, very par 
tially drawn out. The burthen of proof does not lie 
with those who say, increase the quantity of talent in 
any country as much as possible — for such a proposi- 
tion is in conformity with every man's feelings : but 
it lies with those who say, take care to keep that un- 
derstanding weak and trifling, which nature has made 
capable of becoming strong and powerful. The para 
dox is with them, not with us. In all human reason- 
ing, knowledge must be taken for a good, till it can 
be shown to be an evil. But now, nature makes to us 
rich and magnificent presents ; and we say to her — 
You are too luxuriant and munificent — we must keep 
you under, and prune you ; — we have talents enough 
in the other half of the creation ; — and, if you will not 
stupefy and enfeeble the mind of women to our hands, 
we ourselves must expose them to a narcotic process, 
and educate away that fatal redundance with which 
the world is afflicted, and the order of sublunary things 
deranged. 

One of the greatest pleasures of life is conversation ; 
— and the pleasures of conversation are of course en- 
hanced by every increase of knowledge : not that we 
should meet together to talk of alkalis and angles, or 
to add to our stock of history and philology — though 
a little of these things is no bad ingredient in conver- 
sation ; but let the subject be what it may, there is 
always a prodigious difference between the conversa- 
tion of those who have been well educated and of 
those who have not enjoyed this advantage. Educa- 
tion gives fecundity of thought, copiousness of illus- 
tration, quickness, vigour, fancy, words, images, and 
illustrations ; — it decorates every common thing, and 
gives the power of trifling without being undignified 
and absurd. The subjects themselves may not be 
wanted upon which the talents of an educated man 
have been exercised; but there is always a demand 
for those talents which his education has rendered 
strong and quick. Now, really, nothing can be fur- 
ther from our intention than to say any thing rude 
and unpleasant ; but we must be excused for obser- 
ving that it is not now a very common thing to be 
interested by the variety and extent of female know- 
ledge, but it is a very common thing to lament that 
the finest faculties in the world have been confined 
to trifles utterly unworthy of their richness and their 
strength. 

The pursuit of knowledge is the most innocent and 
interesting occupation which can be given to the 
female sex ; nor can there be a better method of check- 
ing a spirit of dissipation than by diffusing a taste for 
literature. The way to attack vice, is by setting 
up something else against it. Give to women, in 
early youth, something to acquire, of sufficient in- 
terest and importance to command the application of 
their mature faculties, and to excite their perse- 
verance in future life ; — teach them that happiness 
is to be derived from the acquisition of knowledge, 
as well as the gratification of vanity : and you will 
raise up a much more formidable barrier against dissi- 
pation than an host of exhortations and invectives can 
supply. 

It sometimes happens that an unfortunate man gets 
drunk with very bad wine, — not to gratify his palate, 
but to forget his cares : he does not set any value on 
what he receives, but on account of what it excludes : 
— it keeps out something worse than itself. Now, 
though it were denied that the acquisition of serious 
knowledge is of itself important to a woman, still it 
prevents a taste for silly and pernicious works of ima- 
gination ; it keeps away the horrid trash of novels ; 
and, in lieu of that eagerness for emotion and adven- 
ture which books of that sort inspire, promotes a calm 
and steady temperament of mind. 

A man Avho deserves such a piece of good fortune, 
may generally find an excellent companion for all the 
vicissitudes of life ; but it is not so easy to find a com- 
panion for his understanding, who has similar pursuits 
with himself, or who can comprehend the pleasure he 
derives from them. We really see no reason why 
it should not be otherwise ; nor comprehend how the 
pleasures of domestic life can be promoted by dimi- 



PUBLIC SCHOOLS. 



59 



aishing the number of subjects in which persons who 
are to spend their lives together take a common in- 
terest. 

One of the most agreeable consequences of know- 
ledge is the respect and importance which it commu- 
nicates to old age. Men rise in character often as 
they increase in years ; — they are venerable from 
what they have acquired, and pleasing from what they 
can impart. If they outlive their faculties, the mere 
frame itself is respected for what it once contained ; 
but women (such is their unfortunate style of educa- 
tion) hazard every thing upon one cast of the die ;— ^ 
when youth is gone, all is gone. No human creature 
gives his admiration for nothing : either the eye must 
be charmed, or the understanding gratified. A wo- 
man must talk wisely or look well. Every human 
being must put up with the coldest civility, who has 
neither the charms of youth nor the wisdom of age. 
Neither is there the slightest commiseration for de- 
cayed accomplishments ; — no man mourns over the 
fragments of a dancer, or drops a tear on the relics of 
musical skill. They are flowers destined to perish ; 
but the decay of great talents is always the subject of 
solemn pity ; and, even when their last memorial is 
over, their ruins and vestiges are regarded with pious 
affection. 

There is no connection between the ignorance in 
which women are kept, and the preservation of moral 
and religious principle ; and yet certainly there is, in 
the minds of some timid and respectable persons, a 
vague, indefinite dread of knowledge, as if it were 
capable of producing these effects. It might almost 
be supposed, from the dread which the propagation of 
knowledge has excited, that there was some great 
secret which was to be kept in impenetrable obscurity, 
— that all moral rules were a species of delusion and 
imposture, the detection of which, by the improve- 
ment of the understanding, would be attended with 
the most fatal consequences to all, and particularly to 
women. If we could possibly understand what these 
great secrets were, we might perhaps be disposed to 
concur in their preservation ; but believing that all 
the salutary rules which are imposed on women are 
the result of true wisdom, and productive of the 
greatest happiness, we cannot understand how they 
are to become less sensible of this truth in proportion 
as their power of discovering truth in general is in- 
creased, and the habit of viewing questions with ac- 
curacy and comprehension established by education. 
There are men, indeed, who are always exclaiming 
against every species of power, because it is connect- 
ed Avith danger : their dread of abuses is so much 
stronger than their admiration of uses, that they 
would cheerfully give up the use of fire, gunpowder, 
and printing, to be freed from robbers, incendiaries, 
and libels. It is true, that every increase of know- 
ledge may possibly render depravity more depraved, 
as well as it may increase the strength of virtue. It 
is in itself only power ; and its value depends on its 
application. But, trust to the natural love of good 
where there is no temptation to be bad — it operates 
nowhere more forcibly than in education. No man, 
whether he be tutor, guardian, or friend, ever con- 
tents himself with infusing the mere ability to ac- 
quire ; but giving the power, he gives with it a taste 
for the wise and rational exercise of that power ; so 
that an educated person is not only one with stronger 
and better faculties than others, but with a more use- 
ful propensity — a disposition better cultivated — and 
associations of a higher and more important class. 

In short, and to recapitulate the main points upon 
which we have insisted : — Why the disproportion in 
knowledge between the two sexes should be so great, 
when the inequality in natural talents is so small ; or 
why the understanding of women should be lavished 
upon trifles, when nature has made it capable of high- 
er and better things, we profess ourselves not able to 
understand. Thf affectation charged upon female 
knowledge is best cured by making that knowledge 
more general : and the economy devolved upon women 
is best secured by the ruin, disgrace, and inconveni- 
ence which proceeds from neglecting it. For the care 
of children nature has made a direct and powerful 



provision ; and the gentleness and elegance of women 
is the natural consequence of that desire to please, 
which is productive of the greatest part of civilization 
and refinement, and which rests upon a foundation 
too deep to be shaken by any such modifications in 
education as we have proposed. If you educate wo- 
men to attend to dignified and important subjects, you 
are multiplying, beyond measure, the chances of 
human improvement, by preparing and medicating 
those early impressions, which always come from the 
mother ; and which, in a great majority of instances, 
are quite decisive of character and genius. Nor is it 
only in the business of education that women would 
influence the destiny of men. If women know more, 
men must learn more — for ignorance would then be 
shameful — and it would become the fashion to be in- 
structed. The instruction of women improves the 
stock of national talents, and employs more minds for 
the instruction and amusement of the world ; — it in- 
creases the pleasures of society, by multiplying the 
topics upon which the two sexes take a common inter- 
est ; and makes marriage an intercourse of understand- 
ing as well as of affection, by giving dignity and 
importance to the female character. The education 
of women favours public morals ; it provides for every 
season of life, as well as for the brightest and the best ; 
and leaves a Avoman when she is stricken by the hand 
of time, not as she now is, destitute of every thing, and 
neglected by all ; but with the full power and the 
splendid attractions of knowledge, — diffusing the ele- 
gant pleasures of polite literature, and receiving the 
just homage of learned and accomplished men. 



PUBLIC SCHOOLS. 



(Edinburgh Review, 1810.) 

8vo. 



Remarks on the System of Education in Public Schools, 
Hatchard. London, 1809. 

There is a set of well-dressed, prosperous gentle- 
men who assemble daily at Mr. Hatchard's shop ; — 
clean, civil personages, well in with people in power, 
— delighted with every existing institution — and al- 
most with every existing circumstance : — and, every 
now and then, one of these personages writes a little 
book ; — and the rest praise that little book — expecting 
to be praised, in their turn, for their own little books : 
— and of these little books, thus written by these clean, 
civil personages, so expecting to be praised, the 
pamphlet before us appears to be one. 

The subject of it is the advantage of public schools ; 
and the author, very creditably to himself, ridicules 
the absurd clamour, first set on foot by Dr. Rennel, 
of the irreligious tendency of public schools : he then 
proceeds to an investigation of the effects which pub- 
lic schools may produce upon the moral character ; 
and here the subject becomes more difficult, and the 
pamphlet worse. 

In arguing any large or general question, it is of in- 
finite importance to attend to the first feelings which 
the mention of the topic has a tendency to excite ; and 
the name of a public school brings with it immediately 
the idea of brilliant classical attainments ; but, upon 
the importance of these studies, we are not now offer- 
ing any opinion. The only points for consideration 
are, whether boys are put in the way of becoming 
good and wise men by these schools ; and whether 
they actually gather there those attainments which it 
pleases mankind, for the time being, to consider as 
valuable, and to decorate by the name of learning. 

By a public school, we mean any endowed place of 
education, of old standing, to which the sons of gen- 
tlemen resort in considerable numbers, and where 
they continue to reside, from eight or nine, to eighteen 
years of age. We do not give this as a definition 
which would have satisfied Porphyry or Duns-Scotus, 
but as one sufficiently accurate for our purpose. The 
characteristic features of these schools are, their an- 
tiquity, the numbers, and the ages of the young people 
who are educated at them. We beg leave, however, 
to premise, that we have not the slightest intention of 
insinuating any thing to the disparagement of the 
present discipline or present rulers of these schools, 



WORKS OF THE REV. SIDNEY SMITH. 



as compared with other times and other men: we 
have no reason whatever to doubt that they are as 
ably governed at this as they have been at any pre- 
ceding period. Whatever objections we may have to 
these institutions, they are to faults, not depending 
on present administration, but upon original con- 
struction.* 

At a public school (for such is the system estab- 
lished by immemorial custom), every boy is alter- 
nately tyrant and slave. The power which the elder 
part of these communities exercises over the younger 
is exceedingly great — very difficult to be controlled — 
and accompanied, not unfrequently, with crueltjfand 
caprice. It is the common law of the place, that the 
young should be implicitly obedient to the elder boys ; 
and this obedience resembles more the submission of 
a slave to his master, or of a sailor to his captain, 
than the common and natural deference which would 
always be shown by one boy to another a few years 
older than himself. Now, this system we cannot 
help considering as an evil, — because it inflicts upon 
boys, for two or three years of their lives, many pain- 
ful hardships, and much unpleasant servitude. These 
sufferings might perhaps be of some use in military 
schools ; but, to give to a boy the habit of enduring 
privations to which he will never again be called upon 
to submit — to inure him to pains which he will never 
again feel — and to subject him to the privation of com- 
forts with which he will always hi future abound — is 
surely not a very useful and valuable severity in edu- 
cation. It is not the life in miniature which he is to 
lead hereafter — nor does it bear any relation to it : — 
he will never again be subjected to so much insolence 
and caprice ; nor ever, in all human probability, called 
upon to make so many sacrifices. The servile obedi- 
ence which it teaches might be useful to a menial 
domestic ; or the habits of enterprise which it en- 
courages prove of importance to a military partisan ; 
but we cannot see what bearing it has upon the calm, 
regular, civil life, which the sons of gentlemen, des- 
tined to opulent idleness, or to any of the three learned 
professions, are destined to lead. Such a system 
makes many boys very miserable ; and produces those 
bad effects upon the temper and disposition, which 
unjust suffering always does produce ; — but what good 
it does we are much at a loss to conceive. Reasonable 
obedience is extremely useful in forming the disposi- 
tion. Submission to tyranny lays the foundation of 
.hatred, suspicion, cunning, and a variety of odious 
passions. We are convinced that those young people 
will turn out to be the best men, who have been 
guarded most effectually in their childhood, from every 
species of useless vexation ; and experienced, in the 
greatest degree, the blessings of a wise and rational 
indulgence. But even if these effects upon future 
character are not produced, still four or five years in 
childhood make a very considerable period of human 
existence ; and it is by no means a trifling considera- 
tion whether they are passed happily or unhappily. 
The wretchedness of school tyranny is trifling enough 
to a man who only contemplates it in ease of body and 
tranquillity of mind, through the medium of twenty 
intervening years ; but it is quite as real, and quite as 
acute, while it lasts, as any of the sufferings of mature 
life : and the utility of these sufferings, or the price 
paid in compensation for them, should be clearly made 
out to a conscientious parent before he consents to 
expose his children to them. 

This system also gives to the elder boys an absurd 
and pernicious opinion of their own importance, which 
is often with difficulty effaced by a considerable com- 
merce with the world. The head of a public school is 
generally a very conceited young man, utterly ignorant 
of his own dimensions) and losing all that habit of 

* A public school is thought to be the best cure for the inso- 
lence of youthful aristocracy. This insolence, however, is not 
a little increased by the homage of masters, and would soon 
meet with its natural check in the wojld. There can be no 
occasion to bring five hundred boys together to teach a young 
nobleman that proper demeanor which lie would learn so 
much better from the'first English gentleman whom he might 
think proper to insult. 



conciliation towards others, and that anxiety for self 
improvement, which result from the natural modesty 
of youth. Nor is this conceit very easily and speedily 
gotten rid of; — we have seen (if we mistake not) pub- 
he school importance lasting through the half of after 
fife, strutting in lawn, swelling in ermine, and dis- 
playing itself, both ridiculously and offensively, in the 
haunts and business of bearded men. 

There is a manliness in the athletic exercises ot 
public schools which is as seductive to the imagina- 
tion as it is utterly unimportant in itself. Of what 
importance is it in after fife whether a boy can play 
well or ill at cricket ; or row a boat with the skill and 
precision of a waterman? If our young lords and 
esquires were hereafter to wrestle together' in public, 
or the gentlemen of the Bar to exhibit Olympic games 
in Hilary Term, the glory attached to these exercises 
at public schools would be rational and important. 
But of what use is the body of an athlete, when we 
have good laws over our heads, — or when a pistol, a 
postchaise, or a porter, can be hired for a few shil- 
lings ? A gentleman does nothing but ride or walk ; 
and yet such a ridiculous stress is laid upon the man- 
liness of the exercises customary at public schools — 
exercises hi which the greatest blockheads commonly 
excel the most — which often render habits of idleness 
inveterate — and often lead to foolish expense and dis- 
sipation at a more advanced period of life. 

One of the supposed advantages of a public school 
is the greater knowledge of the world which a boy is 
considered to derive from those situations ; but if, by 
a knowledge of the world, is meant a knowledge of 
the forms and manners which are found to be the most 
pleasing and useful in the world, a boy from a public 
school is almost always extremely deficient in these 
particulars ; and his sister, Who has remained at home 
at the apron-strings of her mother, is very much his 
superior in the science of manners. It is probably 
true, that a boy at a public school has made more ob- 
servations on human character, because he has had 
more opportunities of observing than have been en- 
joyed by young persons educated either at home or at 
private schools : but this little advance gained at a 
public school is so soon overtaken at college or in the 
world, that, to have made it, is of the least possible 
consequence, and utterly undeserving of any risk in- 
curred in the acquisition. Is it any injury to a man 
of thirty or thirty-five years of age — to a learned Ser- 
jeant or venerable dean — that at eighteen they did not 
know so much of the world as some other boys of the 
same standing? They have probably escaped the 
arrogant character so often attendant upon this trifling 
superiority ; nor is there much chance that they have 
ever fallen into the common and youthful error of 
mistaking a premature initiation into vice for a know- 
ledge of the ways of mankind ; and, in addition to 
these salutary exemptions, a winter in London brings 
it all to a level ; and offers to every novice the ad- 
vantages which are supposed to be derived from this 
precocity of confidence and polish. 

According to the genera 1 prejudice hi favour of pub- 
lic schools, it would be thought quite as absurd an^ 
superflous to enumerate the illustrious characters who 
have been bred at our three great seminaries of this 
description, as it would be to descant upon the illus- 
trious characters who have passsed in and out of 
London over our three great bridges. Almost eve- 
ry conspicuous person is supposed to have been 
educated at public schools ; and there are scarce- 
ly any means (as it is imagined) of making an actual 
Comparison ; and yet, great as the rage is, and long 
has been, for public schools, it is very remark- 
able, that the most eminent men in every art and 
science have not been educated at public schools ; and 
this is true, even if we include, in the term of public 
schools, not only Eton, Winchester, and Westminster, 
but the Charter-House, St. Paul's School, Merchant 
Tailors', Rugby, and every school m England, at all 
conducted upon the plan of the three first. The great 
schools of Scotland we do not call public schools ; be- 
cause, in these, the mixture of domestic life gives to 
them a widely different character. Spenser, Pope, 



PUBLIG SCHOOLS. 



61 



Shakspeare, Butler, Rochester, Spratt, Parnell, Garth, 
Congreve, Gay, Swift, Thompson, Shenstone, Aken- 
side, Goldsmith, Samuel Johnson, Beaumont and 
Fletcher, Ben Jonson, Sir Philip Sydney, Savage, 
Arbuthnot, and Burns, among the poets, were not 
educated in the system of English schools. Sir Isaac 
Newton, Maclaurin, Wallis, Hamstead, Saunderson, 
Simpson, and Napier, among men of science, were not 
educated at public schools. The three best historians 
that the English language has produced, Clarendon, 
Hume, and Robertson, were not educated at public 
schools. Public schools have done little in England 
for the fine arts — as in the examples of Inigo Jones, 
Vanbrugh, Reynolds, Gainsborough, Garrick, &c. 
The great medical writer and discoverers in Great 
Britain, Harvey, Cheselden, Hunter, Jenner, Meade, 
Brown,' and Cullen, were not educated at public 
schools. Of the great writers on morals and meta- 
physics, it was not the system of public schools which 
oroduced Bacon, Shaftesbury, Hobbes, Berkeley, But- 
ter, Hume, Hartley, or Dugald Stewart. The greatest 
discoverers in chemistry have not been brought up at 
public schools ; — we mean Dr. Priestley, Dr. Black, 
and Mr. Davy. The only Englishmen who have 
evinced a remarkable genius, in modern times, for the 
art of war,— the Duke of Marlborough, Lord Peter- 
borough, General Wolfe, and Lord Clive, were all 
trained in private schools. So were Lord Coke, Sir 
Matthew Hale, and Lord Chancellor Hardwicke, and 
Chief Justice Holt, among the lawyers. So also, 
among statesmen, were Lord Burleigh, Walsingham, 
the Earl of Strafford, Thurloe, Cromwell, Hampden, 
Lord Clarendon, Sir Walter Raleigh, Sydney, Russel, 
Sir W. Temple, Lord Somers, Burke, Sheridan, Pitt. 
In addition to this list, we must not forget the name, 
of such eminent scholars and men of letters, as Cud- 
worth, Chillingworth, Tillotson, Archbishop King, 
Selden, Conyers, Middleton, Bentley, Sir Thomas 
More, Cardinal Wolsey, Bishops Sherlock and Wil- 
kins, Jeremy Taylor, Isaac Hooker, Bishops Usher, 
Stillingfleet, and Spelman, Dr. Samuel Clarke, Bishop 
Hoadley, and Dr. Lardner. N^j must it be forgotten, 
in this examination, that none of the conspicious 
writers upon political economy which this country 
has as yet produced, have been brought up in public 
schools. If it be urged that public schools have only 
assumed their present character within this last cen- 
tury, or half century, and that what are now called 
public schools partook, before this period, of the 
nature of private schools, there must then be added to 
our lists the names of Milton, Dryden, Addison, &c. 
&c. : and it will follow, that the English have done 
almost all that they have done in the arts and sciences, 
without the aid of that system of education to which 
they are now so much attached. Ample as this cata- 
logue of celebrated names already is, it would be easy 
to^double it ; yet, as it stands, it is obviously sufficient 
to show that great eminence may be attained in any 
line of fame without the aid of public schools. Some, 
more striking inferences might perhaps be drawn 
from it; but we content ourselves with the simple 
fact. 

The most important peculiarity in the constitution 
of a public school is its numbers, which are so great, 
that a close inspection of the master into the studies 
and conduct of each individual is quite impossible. 
We must be allowed to doubt, whether such an ar- 
rangement is favourable either to literature or morals. 

Upon this system, a boy is left almost entirely to 
himself, to impress upon his own mind, as well as he 
can, the distant advantages of knowledge, and to with- 
stand, from his own innate resolution, the examples 
and the seductions of idleness. A firm character sur- 
vives this brave neglect ; and very exalted talents may 
sometimes remedy it by subsequent diligence : but 
schools are not made for a few youths of pre-eminent 
talents, and strong characters ; such prizes can, of 
course, be drawn but by a very few parents. The best 
school is that which is best accommodated to the 
*re3tP5t variety of characters, and which embraces 
xhe greatest number of cases. It cannot be the main 
object of education to Binder the splendid more splen- 



did, and to lavish care upon those who would almost 
thrive without any care at all. A public school does 
this effectually; but it commonly leaves the idle 
almost as idle, and the dull almost as dull, as it found 
them. It disdains the tedious cultivation of those 
middling talents of which only the great mass of 
human beings are possessed. When a strong desire 
of improvement exists, it is encouraged, but no pains 
are taken to inspire it. A boy is cast in among five 
or six hundred other boys, and is left to form his own 
character ; — if his love of knowledge survives this 
severe trial, it, in general, carries him very far : and, 
upon the same principle, a savage, who grows up to 
manhood, is, in general, well made, and free from all 
bodily defects ; not because the severities of such a 
state are favourable to animal life, but because they 
are so much the reverse, that none but the strongest 
can survive them. A few boys are incorrigibly idle 
and a few incorrigibly eager for knowledge ; but the 
great mass are in a state of doubt and fluctuation 
and they come to school for the express purpose, noj 
of being left to themselves — for that could be dom 
any where — but that their wavering tastes and pro- 
pensities should be decided by the intervention of a 
master. In a forest, or public school for oaks and 
elms, the trees are left to themselves ; the strong 
plants live, and the weak ones die : the towering oak 
that remains is admired; the saplings that perish 
around it are cast into the flames and forgotten. But 
it is not surely to the vegetable struggle of a forest, 
or the hasty glance of a forester^ that a botanist would 
commit a favourite plant ; he would naturally seek for 
it a situation of less hazard, and a cultivator whose 
limited occupations would enable him to give to it a 
reasonable share of his time and attention. The very 
meaning of education seems to us to be, that the old 
should teach the young, and the wise direct the weak ; 
that a man who professes to instruct, should get among 
his pupils, study their characters, gain their affections, 
and form their inclinations and aversions. In a public 
school, the numbers render this impossible ; it is im- 
possible that sufficient time should be found for this 
useful and affectionate interference. Boys, therefore, 
are left to their own crude conceptions and ill-formed 
propensities ; and this neglect is called a spirited and 
manly education. 

In by far the greatest number of cases, we cannot 
think public schools favourable to the cultivation of 
knowledge ; and we have equally strong doubts if they 
be so to the cultivation of morals, though we admit, 
that, upon this point, the most striking arguments 
have been produced in their favour. 

It is contended by the friends to public schools, that 
every person, before he comes to man's estate, must 
run through a certain career of dissipation; and if 
that career is, by the means of a private education, 
deferred to a more advanced period of life, it will only 
be begun with more eagerness, and pursued intomore 
blameable excess. The time must, of course, come 
when every man must be his own master ; when his 
conduct can be no longer regulated by the watchful 
superintendence of another, but must be guided by his 
own discretion. Emancipation must come at last ; 
and we admit, that the object to be aimed at is, that 
such emancipation should be gradual, and not prema- 
ture. Upon this very invidious point of the discus- 
sion, we rather wish to avoid offering any opinion. 
The manners of great schools vary considerably from 
time to time ; and what may have been true many 
years ago, is very possibly not true at the present 
period. In this instance, every parent must be go- 
verned by his own observations and means of informa- 
tion. If the license which prevails at public schools 
is only a fair increase of liberty, proportionate to ad- 
vancing age, and calculated to prevent the bad effects 
of a sudden transition from tutelary thraldom to per- 
fect self-government, it is certainly a good rather than 
an evil. If, on the contrary, there exists in these 
places of education a system of premature debauchery, 
and if they only prevent men from being corrupted by 
the world, by corrupting them before their entry into 
the world, they can then only be looked upon as evils 



of the greatest magnitude, however they may be 
sanctioned by opinion, or rendered familiar to us by 
habit. 

The vital and essential part of a school is the mas- 
ter ; but, at a public school, no boy, or, at the best, 
only a very few, can see enough of him to derive any 
considerable benefit from his character, manners, and 
information. It is certainly of eminent use, particu- 
larly to a young man of rank, that he should have 
lived among boys ; but it is only so when they are all 
moderately watched by some superior understanding. 
The morality of boys is generally very imperfect ; 
their notions of honour extremely mistaken ; and their 
objects of ambition frequently very absurd. The pro- 
bability then is, that the kind of discipline they exer- 
cise over each other will produce (when left to itself) 
a great deal of mischief; and yet this is the discip- 
line to which every child at a public school is not only 
necessarily exposed, but principally confined. Our 
objection (we again repeat) is not to the interference 
of boys in the formation of the character of boys ; 
their character, we are persuaded, will be very im- 
perfectly formed without their assistance ; but our 
objection is to that almost exclusive agency which 
they exercise in public schools. 

After having said so much in opposition to the ge- 
neral prejudice in favour of public schools, we may 
be expected to state what species of school we think 
preferable to them ; for if public schools, with all their 
disadvantagas, are the best that can actually be found, 
or easily attained, the objections to them are certain- 
ly made to very little purpose. 

We have no hesitation, however, in saying, that 
that education seems to us to be the best which 
mingles a domestic with a school life ; and which 
gives to a youth the advantage which is to be derived 
from the learning of a master, and the emulation 
which results from the society of other boys, together 
with the affectionate vigilance which he must experi- 
ence in the house of his parents. But where this 
species of education, from peculiarity of circumstances 
or situation, is not attainable, we are disposed to think 
a society of twenty or thirty boys, under the guidance 
of a learned man, and, above all, of a man of good 
sense, to be a seminary the best adapted for the edu- 
cation of youth. The numbers are sufficient to excite 
a considerable degree of emulation, to give to a boy 
some insight into the diversities of the human cha- 
racter, and to subject him to the observation and 
control of his superiors. It by no means follows, that 
a judicious man should always interfere with his au- 
thority and advice because he has always the means ; 
ne may connive at many things which he cannot ap- 
prove, and suffer some little failures to proceed to a 
certain extent, which, if indulged in wider limits, 
would be attended with irretrievable mischief; he 
will be aware, that his object is to fit his pupil for the 
world ; that constant control is a very bad prepara- 
tion for complete emancipation from all control ; that 
it is not bad policy to expose a young man, under the 
eye of superior wisdom, to some of those dangers 
which will assail him hereafter in greater number, 
and in greater strength — when he has only his own 
resources to depend upon. A private education, con- 
ducted upon these principles, is not calculated*to gra- 
tify quickly the vanity of a parent who is blest with a 
child of strong character and pre-eminent abilities ; 
to be the first scholar of an obscure master, at an ob- 
scure place, is no very splendid distinction ; nor does 
it afford that opportunity, of which so many parents 
are desirous, of forming great connections for their 
children: but if the object be, to induce the young to 
love knowledge and virtue, we are inclined to suspect, 
that, for the average of human talents and characters, 
these are the situations in which such tastes will be 
the most effectually formed. 



WORKS OF THE REV. SIDNEY SMITH. - 

TOLERATION. (Edinburgh Review, 1811.) 



Hints on Toleration, in Five Essays, fyc. svggested for the 
Consideration of Lord Viscount Sidmouth, and the Dissent- 
ers. By Philagath arches. London. 1310. 

If a prudent man sees a child playing with a porce- 
lain cup of great value, he takes the vessel out of his 
hand, pats him on the head, tells him his mamma will 
be sorry if it is broken, and gently cheats him into the 
use of some less precious substitute. Why will Lord 
Sidmouth meddle with the Toleration Act, when there 
are so many other subjects in which his abilities might 
be so eminently useful — when enclosure bills are drawn 
up with such scandalous negligence — turnpike roads so 
shamefully neglected — and public conveyances illegiti- 
mately loaded in the face of day, and in defiance of the 
wisest legislative provisions ? We confess our trepi- 
dation at seeing the Toleration Act in the hands of 
Lord Sidmouth ; and should be very glad if it were 
fairly back in the statute book, and the sedulity of this 
well-meaning nobleman diverted into another channel. 
The alarm and suspicion of the Dissenters upon 
these measures are wise and rational. They are right 
to consider the Toleration Act as their palladium ; and 
they may be certain that in this country there is always 
a strong party ready, not only to prevent the further 
extension of tolerant principles, but to abridge (if they 
dared) their present operation within the narrowest 
limits. Whoever makes this attempt, will be sure to 
make it under professions of the most earnest regard 
for mildness and toleration, and with the strongest 
declarations of respect for King William, the Revolu- 
tion, and the principles which seated the House of 
Brunswick on the fhrone of these realms; and then 
will follow the clauses for whipping Dissenters, im- 
prisoning preachers, and subjecting them to rigid 
qualifications, &c. &c. &c. The infringement on the 
militia acts is a mere pretence. The real object is to 
diminish the number of Dissenters from the Church of 
England, by abridging the liberties and privileges 
they now possess. This is the project which we shall 
examine, for we sinceijely believe it to be the project in 
agitation. The modem which it is proposed to attack 
the Dissenters is, first, by exacting greater qualifica- 
tions in their teachers ; next, by preventing the inter- 
change or itinerancy of preachers, and fixing them to 
one spot. 

It can never, we presume, be intended to subject 
dissenting ministers to any kind of theological examina- 
tion. A teacher examined in doctrinal opinions, by 
another teacher who differs from him, is so very absurd 
a project, that we entirely acquit Lord Sidmouth of 
any intention of this sort. We rather presume his 
lordship to mean, that a man who professes to teach 
his fellow creatures, should at least have made some 
progress in human learning ; that he should not be 
wholly without education ; that he should be able at 
least to read and write. If the test is of this very 
ordinary nature, it can scarcely exclude many teachers 
of religion ; and it was hardly worth while, for the 
very insignificant diminution of numbers which this 
must occasion to the dissenting clergy, to have raised 
all the alarm which this attack upon the Toleration 
Act has occasioned. 

But Avithoul any reference to the magnitude of the 
effects, is the principle right ? or, What is the meaning 
of religious toleration? That a man should hold,, 
without pain or penalty, any religious opinions — and '•■ 
choose for his instruction, in the business of salvation, 
any guide whom he pleases ; care being taken that the 
teacher and the doctrine injure neither the policy nor 
the morals of the country. We maintain that perfect I 
religious toleration applies as much to the teacher as 
to the thing taught ; and that it is quite as intolerant 
to make a man hear Thomas, who wants to hear John, 
as it would be to make a man profess Arminian, who 
wished to profess Calvinistical principles. What right 
has any government to dictate to any man who shall 
guide him to heaven, any more than it has to persecute 
the religious tenets by which he hopes to arrive there ? 
You believe that the heretic professes doctrines utterly, 
incompatible with the true spirit of the gospel ; first I 
you burnt him for this— then you whipped him — then 



TOLERATION. 



as 



you fined him — then you put him in prison. All this 
did no good; and for these hundred years last past, 
you have let him alone. The heresy is now firmly 
protected by law ; and you know is must be preached : 
What matters it then, who preaches it ? If the evil 
must be communicated, the organ and instrument 
through which it is communicated cannot be of much 
consequence. It is true, this kind of persecution 
against persons, has not befen quite so much tried as 
the other against doctrines ; but the folly and inexpe- 
diency of it rest precisely upon the same grounds. 

Would it not be a singular thing if the friends of the 
Church of England were to make the most strenuous 
efforts to render their enemies eloquent and learned ? 
and to found places of education for dissenters ? But, 
if their learning would not be a good, why is their ig- 
norance an evil ? — unless it be necessarily supposed, 
that all increase of learning must bring men over to 
the Church of England ; in which supposition the Scot- 
tish and Catholic universities, and the college at Hack- 
ney, would hardly acquiesce. Ignorance surely ma- 
tures and quickens the progress, by insuring the dis- 
solution of absurdity. Rational and learned dissenters 
remain : religious mobs, under some ignorant fanatic 
of the day, become foolish overmuch — dissolve, and 
return to the Church. The Unitarian, who reads and 
writes, gets some sort of discipline, and returns no 
more 

What connection is there (as Lord Sidmouth's plan 
assumes) between the zeal and piety required for re- 
ligious instruction, and the common attainments of 
literature? But if knowledge and education are re- 
quired for religious instruction, why be content with 
the common elements of learning ? why not require 
higher attainments in dissenting candidates for orders ; 
and examine them in the languages in which the books 
of their religion are conveyed ? 

A dissenting minister, of vulgar aspect and homely 
appearance, declares that he entered into that holy 
office because he felt a call ; and a clergyman of the 
Establishment smiles at him for the declaration. But 
it should be remembered, that no minister of the Esta- 
blishment is admitted into orders, before he has been 
expressly interrogated by the bishop whether he feels 
himself called to that sacred office. The doctrine of 
calling, or inward feeling, is quite orthodox in the En- 
glish Church; and, in arguing this subject in parlia- 
ment, it will hardly be contended, that the Episcopa- 
lian only is the judge when that call is genuine, and 
when it is only imaginary. 

The attempt at making the dissenting clergy sta- 
tionary, and persecuting their circulation, appears to 
us quite as unjust and inexpedient as the other mea- 
sure of qualifications. It appears a gross inconsistency 
to say, ' I admit that what you are doing is legal — but 
you must not do it thoroughly and effectually. I allow 
you to propagate your heresy, but I object to all 
means of propagating it which appear to be useful and 
effective. 7 If there are any other grounds upon which 
the circulation of the dissenting clergy is objected to, 
let these grounds be stated and examined ; but to ob- 
ject to their circulation merely because it is the best 
method of effecting th% object which you allow them 
to effect, does appear to be rather unnatural and in- 
consistent. 

It is presumed, in this argument, that the only rea- 
son urged for the prevention of itinerant preachers is, 
the increase of heresy ; for if heresy is not increased 
by it, it must be immaterial to the feelings of Lord 
Sidmouth, and of the imperial parliament, whether 
Mr. ShufHebottom preaches at Bungay, and Mr.Ringle- 
tub at Ipswich ; or whether an artful vicissitude is 
adopted, and the order of insane predication reversed. 
But, svpposing all this new interference to be just, 
what good will it do ? You find a dissenting preacher, 
whom you have prohibited, still continuing to preach, 
or preaching at Ealing when he ought to preach at 
Acton : his number is taken, and the next morning he 
is summoned. Is it believed that this description of 
persons can be put down by fine and imprisonment ? 
His fine is paid tor him, and he returns from imprison- 
ment ten times as much sought after and as popular 
as he was before. This is a receipt for making a stu- 



pid preacher popular, and a popular preacher more 
popular, but can have no possible tendency to re vent 
the mischief against which it is levelled. It. is pre- 
cisely the old history of persecution against opinions 
turned into a persecution against persons. The prisons 
will be filled — the enemies of the Church made ene- 
mies of the state also — and the Methodists rendered 
ten times more actively mad than they are at present. 
This is the direct and obvious tendency of Lord Sid- 
mouth's plan. 

Nothing dies so hard and rallies so often as intole- 
rance. The fires are put out, and no living nostril has 
scented the nidor of a human creature roasted for 
faith ; then, after this, the prison-doors were got open, 
and the chains knocked off; and now Lord Sidmouth 
only begs that men who disagree with him in. reli- 
gious opinions maybe deprived of all civil offices, and 
not be allowed to hear the preachers they like best. 
Chains and whips, he would not hear of; bu.; these 
mild gratifications of his bill every orthodox mind is 
surely entitled to. The hardship would indeed be 
great if a churchman were deprived of the amusement 
of putting a dissenting parson in prison. We are con- 
vinced Lord Sidmouth is a very amiable and well-in- 
tentioned man : his error is not the error of his heart, 
but of his' time, above which few men ever rise. It is 
the error of some four or five hundred thousand En- 
glish gentlemen, Of decent education and worthy cha- 
racters, who conscientiously believe that they are 
punishing, and continuing incapacities, for the good of 
the state ; while they are, in fact (though without 
knowing it) only gratifying that insolence, hatred, and 
revenge, which all human beings are unfortuna :ely so 
ready to feel against those who will not conform to 
their own sentiments. 

But, instead of making the dissenting churches po- 
pular, why not make the English church more popular, 
and raise the English clergy to the privileges of the 
Dissenters ? In any parish of England, any layman or 
clergyman, by paying sixpence, can open a place of 
worship, — provided it be not the worship of the Church 
of England. If he wishes to attack the doctrines of 
the bishop or the incumbent, he is not compelled to 
ask the consent of any person ; but if, by any evil 
chance, he should be persuaded of the truth of those 
doctrines, and build a chapel or mount a pulpit to sup- 
port them, he is instantly put in the spiritual court ; 
for the regular incumbent, who has a legal monopoly 
of this doctrine, does not suffer any interloper; 
and without his consent, it is illegal to preach the doc- 
trines of the church within his precincts.* Now this 
appears to us a great and manifest absurdity, and a dis- 
advantage against the Established Church which very 
few establishments could bear. »The persons who 
preach and who build chapels, or for whom cha- 
pels are built, among the Dissenters, are active cle- 

* It might be supposed that the general interests of the 
Church would outweigh the particular interests of the rector; 
and that any clergyman would be glad to see places of wor- 
ship opened within his parish for the doctrines of the Esta- 
blished Church. The fact, however, is exactly the reverse. 
It is scarcely possible to obtain permission from the esta- 
blished clergyman of the parish to open a chapel there ; and 
when it is granted, it is granted upon very hard and interested 
conditions. The parishes of St. George— of St. James— of 
Mary-le-bone — and of St. Ann's, in London — may, in the pa- 
rish churches, chapels of ease, and mercenary chapels, con- 
tain, perhaps, one-hundredth part of their Episcopalian inha- 
bitants. Let the rectors, lay and clerical, meet toget! }f, and 
give notice that any clergyman of the Church of England, 
approved by the bishop, may preach there ; and we will ven- 
ture to say that places of worship capable of containing 20,000 
persons would be built within ten years. But, in these cases, 
the interest of the rector and of the Establishment is not the 
same. A chapel belonging to the Swedenborgians, or Method- 
ists of the New Jerusalem, was offered, two or three years 
since, in London, to a clergyman of the Establishment. The 
proprietor was tired of his irrational tenants, and wished for 
better doctrine. The rector (since a dignitary) with every 
possible compliment to the fitness of the person in question, 
positively refused the application ; and the church remains in 
the hands of the Methodists. No particular blame is intended, 
by this anecdote, against the individual rector. He acted as 
many have done before and since ; but the incumbent clergy- 
man ought to possess no such power. It is his interest, but 
not the interest of the Establishment.. 



04 



WORKS OF THE REV. SIDNEY SMITH. 



ver persons, with considerable talents for that kind 
of employment. These talents have, with them, 
their free and unbounded scope ; while in the Eng- 
lish Church tbey are wholly extinguished and de- 
stroyed. Till this evil is corrected, the church con- 
tends with fearful odds against its opponents. On the 
one side, any man who can command the attention of 
a congregation — to whom nature has given the animal 
and intellectual qualifications of a preacher — such a 
man is the member of every corporation ; — all impedi- 
ments are removed : — there is not a single position in 
Great Britain which he may not take, provided he is 
hostile to the Established Church. In the other case, 
if the English Church were to breed up a Massillon or 
a Bourdaioue, he finds every place occupied ; and eve- 
ry where a regular and respectable clergyman ready 
to put him in the spiritual court, if he attracts within 
his precincts, any attention to the doctrines and wor- 
ship of the Established Church. 

The necessity of having the Bishop's consent would 
prevent any improper person from preaching. That 
consent should be withheld, not capriciously, but for 
good and lawful cause to be assigned. 

The profits of an incumbent proceed from fixed or 
voluntary contributions. The fixed could not be affect- 
ed ; and the voluntary ought to vary according to the 
exertions of the incumbent and the good will of the 
parishioners ; but, if this is wrong, pecuniary compen- 
sation might be made (at the discretion of the ordina- 
ry, from the supernumerary to the regular clergyman.* 
Such a plan, it is true, would make the Church of Eng- 
land more popular in its nature ; and it ought to be 
made more popular, or it will not endure for another 
half century. There are two methods ; the Church 
must be made more popular or the Dissenters less so. 
To effect the latter object by force and restriction is 
unjust and impossible. The only remedy seems to be, 
to grant to the church the same privileges which are 
enjoyed by the Dissenters, and to excite in one party, 
that competition of talent which is of such palpable 
advantage to the other. 

A remedy suggested by some well-wishers to the 
Church, is the appointment of men to benefices who 
have talents for advancing the interests of religion ; 
but till each particular patron can be persuaded to care 
more for the general good of the Church than for the 
particular good of the person whom he patronizes, 
little expectation of improvement can be derived from 
this quarter. 

The competition between the Established clergy, to 
which this method would give birth, would throw the 
incumbent in the back-groyund only when he was unfit 
to stand forward, — immoral, negligent, or stupid. His 
income would still remain ; and if his influence were 
superseded by a man of better qualities and attain- 
ments, the general good of the Establishment would 
be consulted by the change. The beneficed clergyman 
would always come to the contest with great advan- 
tages; and his deficiencies must be very great indeed, 
if he lost the esteem of his parishioners. But the con- 
test would rarely or ever take place, where the friends 
of the Establishment were not numerous enough for all. 
At present, the selfish incumbent, who cannot accom- 
modate the fiftieth part of his parishioners, is deter- 
mined that no one else shall do it for him. It is in 
such situations that the benefit to the establishment 
would be greatest, and the injury to the appointed 
minister none at all. 

We beg of men of sense to reflect, that the question is 
not whether they wish the English Church to stand as 
it now is, but whether the English Church can stand 
as it now is ; and whether the moderate activity here 
recommented is not themininum of exertion necessary 
for its preservation. At the same time we hope no- 
body will rate our sagacity so very low as to imagine 
we have much hope that any measure of the kind will 
ever be adopted. All establishments die of dignity. 
They are too proud to think themselves ill, and to 
take a little physic. 

To show that we have not misstated the obstinacy 
or the conscience of sectaries, and the spirit with 

* All this has been placed on a better footing. 



which they will meet the regulations of Lord Sid 
mouth, we will lay before our readers the sentiments 
of Philagatharches — a stern subacid Dissenter. 

'I shall not en.ter into a comprehensive discussion of the 
nature of a call to the ministerial office; but deduce my pro- 
position from a sentiment admitted equally by conformists 
and non-conformists. It is essential to the nature of a call to 
preach "that a man be moved by the Holy Ghost to enter upon 
the work of the ministry :"'-and if the Spirit of God act pow- 
erfully upon his heart to constrain him to appear as a public 
teacher of religion, who shall command him to desist ? We 
have seen that the sanction of the magistrate can give no 
authority to preach the gospel; and if he were to forbid our 
exertions, we must persist in the work: we dare not relinquish 
a task that God has required us to perform; we cannot keep 
our consciences in peace, if our lips are closed in silence, while 
the Holy Ghost is moving our hearts to proclaim the tidings of 
salvation: "Yea, woe is unto me," saith St. Paul, "if I preach 
not the gospel." Thus, when the Jewish priests had taken 
Peter and John into custody, and after examining them con- 
cerning their doctrine, "commanded them not to speak at all, 
nor to teach in the name of Jesus," these apostolical champions 
of the cross undauntedly replied, "Whether it be right in the 
sight of God to hearken unto you more than unto God, judge 
ye; for wc cannot but speak the things which we have seen 
and heard." Thus, also, in our day, when the Holy Ghost 
excites a man to preach the gospel to his fellow sinners, his 
message is sanctioned by an authority which is " far above all 
principality and power ; and consequently, neither needs the 
approbation of subordinate rulers, nor admits of revocation by 
their countermanding edicts. 

'3dly. He who receives a license should not expect to derive 
from it a testimony of qualification to preach. 

'It would be grossly absurd to seek a testimony of this de- 
scription from any single individual, even though he were an 
experienced veteran in the service of Christ; for all are fallible; 
and under some unfavourable prepossession, even the wisest Of 
the best of men might give an erroneous decision upon the 
case. But this observation will gain additional force when we 
suppose the power of judging transferred to the person of the 
magistrate. We cannot presume that a civil ruler understands 
as much of theology as a minister of the gospel. His necessary 
duties prevent him from critical)} 7 investigating questions upon 
divinity; and confine his attention to that particular depart- 
ment which society has deputed him to occupy; and hence to 
expect at his hands a' testimony of qualification to preach 
would be almost as ludicrous as to require an obscure country 
curate to fill the office of Lord Chancellor. 

'But again — admitting that a magistrate who is nominated 
by the sovereign to issue forth licenses to dissenting ministers, 
is competent to the task of judging of their natural and acquired 
abilities, it must still remain a doubtful question whether they 
are moved to preach by the influences of the Holy Ghost: for 
it is the prerogative of God alone to "search the heart and try 
the reins " of the children of men. Consequently, after every 
effort of the ruling powers to assume to themselves the right of 
judging whether a man be or be not qualified to preach, the 
most essential property of the call must remain to be deter- 
mined by the conscience of the individual. 

'It is further worthy of observation that the talents of a 
preacher may be acceptable to many persons, if not to him who 
issues the license. The taste of a person thus high in office 
may be too refined to derive gratification from any but the most 
learned, intelligent, and accomplished preachers. Yet, as the 
gospel is sent to the poor as well as to the rich, perhaps hun- 
dreds of preachers may be highly acceptable, much esteemed, 
and eminently useful in their respective circles, who would be 
despised as men of mean attainments by one whose mind is 
well stored with literature, and cultivated by science. From 
these remarks I infer, that a man's own judgment must be the 
criterion, in determining what l^ie of conduct to pursue before 
he begins to preach : and the opinion of the people to whom he 
ministers must determine whether it be desirable that he should 
continue to fill their pulpit.' — (168 — 173.) 

The sentiments of Philagatharches are expressed 
still more strongly in a subsequent passage. 

'Here a question may arise — what line of conduct consci- 
entious ministers ought to pursue, if laws were to be enacted, 
forbidding either all dissenting ministers to preach, or only lay 
preachers; or forbidding to preach in an unlicensed place; at 
the same time forbidding to licence persons and places, except 
under such security as the property of the parties would not 
meet, or under limitations to which their consciences would 
not accede. What has been advanced ought to outweigh 
every consideration of temporal interest ; and if the evil genius 
of persecution were to appear again, I pray God that we might 
all be faithful to Him who has called us to preach the gospel. 
Under such circumstances, let us continue to preach: if fined, 
let us pay the penalty, and persevere in preaching; and when 
unable to pay the fine, or deeming it impolitic so to do, let us 
submit to go quietly to prison, but with the resolution still to 
preach on the first opportunity, and, if possible, to collect a 



CHARLES FOX. 



65 



church even within the precincts of the gaol. He, who by 
these zealous exertions, becomes the honoured instrument of 
converting one sinner unto God, will find that single seal to 
his ministerial labours an ample compensation for all his suf- 
ferings. In this maimer the venerable apostle of the Gentiles 
both avowed and proved his sincere attachment to the cause in 
which he had embarked: — "The Holy Ghost witnesseth in 
every city, that bonds and afflictions abide me. But none of 
these things move me, neither count I my life dear unto myself, 
so that I might finish my course with joy, and the ministry 
which I have received of the Lord Jesus, to testify the gospel 
of the grace of God." 

'In the early ages of Christianity martyrdom was considered 
an eminent honour; and many of the primitive Christians 
thrust themselves upon the notice of their heathen persecutors, 
that they might be brought to suffer in the cause of that Re- 
deemer whom they ardently loved. In the present day Chris- 
tians in general incline to estimate such rash ardour as a spe- 
cies of enthusiasm, and feel no disposition to court the horrors 
of persecution; yet if such dark and tremendous days were to 
return in this age of the world, ministers should retain their 
stations; they should be true to their charge; they should 
continue their ministrations, each man in his sphere, shining 
with all the lustre of genuine godliness, to dispel the gloom in 
which the nation would then be enveloped. If this line of 
conduct were to be adopted, and acted upon witli decision, the 
cause of piety, of non-conformity, and of itinerant preaching, 
must eventually triumph. All the gaols in the country would 
speedily be filled: those houses of correction which were 
erected for the chastisement of the vicious in the community, 
would be replenished with thousands of the most pious, active, 
and useful men in the kingdom, whose characters are held in 
general esteem. But the ultimate result of such despotic pro- 
ceedings is beyond the ken of human prescience: probably, 
appeals to the public and to the legislature would teem from 
the press, and, under such circumstances, might diffuse a 
revolutionary spirit throughout the country.' — (239 — 243.) 

We quote these opinions at length, not because 
they are the opinions of Philagatharches, but because 
we are confident that they are the opinions of ten 
thousand hot-headed fanatics, and that they would 
firmly and conscientiously be acted upon. 

Philagatharches is an instance (not uncommon, we 
are sorry to say, even among the most rational of the 
Protestant Dissenters) of a love of toleration com- 
bined with a love of persecution. He is a Dissenter, 
a*d earnestly demands religious liberty for that body 
of men ; but as for the Catholics, he would not only 
continue their present disabilities, but load them with 
eve**' new one that could be conceived. He expressly 
says that an Atheist or a Deist may be allowed to 
•propagate their doctrines, but not a Catholic ; and 
then proceeds with all the customary trash against 
that sect wliich nine schoolboys out of ten now know 
how to refute. So it is with Philagatharches , — so it 
is with weak men in every sect. It has ever been our 
object, and (in spite of misrepresentation and abuse) 
ever shall be our object, to put down this spirit — to 
protect the true interests, and to diffuse the true spi- 
rit, of toleration. To a well-supported national Estab- 
lishment, effectually discharging its duties, we are 
very sincere friends. If any man, after he has paid 
his contribution to this great security for the existence 
of religion in any shape, chooses to adopt a religion 
of his own, that man should be permitted to do so 
without let, molestation, or disqualification for any of 
the offices of life. We apologize to men of sense for 
sentiments so trite ; and patiently endure the anger 
which they will excite among those with whom they 
will pass for original. 



CHARLES FOX. (Edinburgh Review, 1811.) 

A Vindication of Mr. Fox's History of the Early Part of the 
Reign of James the Second. By Samuel Heywood, Serjeant- 
at-Law. London. Johnson & Co. 1811. 

Though Mr. Fox's history was of course, as much 
open to animadversion and rebuke as any other book, 
the task, we think, would have become any other per- 
son better than Mr. Rose. The whole of Mr. Fox's 
life was spent in oppposing the profligacy and expo- 
sing the ignorance of his own court. In the first half 
of his political career, while Lord North was losing 
America, and in the latter half, while Mr. Pitt was 
ruining Europe, the creatures of the government were 



eternally exposed to the attacks of this discerning, 
dauntless, and most powerful speaker. Folly and 
corruption never had a more terrible enemy in the 
English House of Commons — one whom it was so im- 
possible to bribe, so hopeless to elude, and so difficult 
to answer. Now it so happened, that, during the 
whole of this period, the historical critic of Mr. Fox 
was employed in subordinate offices of government ; — 
that the detail of taxes passed through his hands ; — 
that he amassed a large fortune by those occupations ; 
and that both in the measures which he supported, 
and in the friends from whose patronage he received 
his emoluments, he was completely and perpetually 
opposed to Mr. Fox. 

Again, it must be remembered, that very great peo- 
ple have very long memories for the injuries which 
they receive, or which they think they receive. No 
speculation was so good, therefore, as to vilify the 
memory of Mr. Fox — nothing so delicious as to lower 
him in the public estimation — no service so likely to 
be well rewarded — so eminently grateful to those of 
whose favour Mr. Rose had so often tasted the sweets, 
and of the value of whose patronage he must, from 
long experience, have been so thoroughly aware. 

We are almost inclined to think that we might at 
one time have worked ourselves up to suspect Mr. 
Rose of being actuated by some of. these motives : — 
not because we have any reason to think worse of 
that gentleman than of most of his political associates, 
but merely because it seemed to us so very probable 
that he should have been so influenced. Our suspi- 
cions, however, were entirely removed by the fre- 
quency and violence of his own protestations. He 
vows so solemnly that he has no bad motive in writing 
his critique, that we find it impossible to withhold 
our belief in his purity. But Mr. Rose does not trust 
to his protestations alone. He is not satisfied with 
assurances that he did not write his book from any 
bad motive, but he informs us that his motive was ex- 
cellent, and is even obliging enough to tell us what 
that motive was. The Earl of Marchmont, it seems, • 
was Mr. Rose's friend. To Mr. Rose he left his 
manuscripts ; and among these manuscripts was a 
narrative written by Sir Patrick Hume, an ancestor of 
the Earl of Marchmont, and one of the leaders in 
Argyle's rebellion. Of Sir Patrick Hume, Mr. Rose 
conceives (a little erroneously to be sure, but he as- 
sures us he does conceive) Mr. Fox to have spoken 
disrespectfully ; and the case comes out, therefore, as 
clearly as possible, as follows. 

Sir Patrick was the progenitor, and Mr. Rose was 
the friend and sole executor, of the Earl of March- 
mont ; and therefore, says Mr. Rose, I consider it as 
a sacred duty to vindicate the character of Sir Patrick, 
and, for that purpose, to publish a long and elaborate 
critique upon all the doctrines and statements contain- 
ed in Mr. Fox's history ! This appears to us about 
as satisfactory an explanation of Mr. Rose's author- 
ship, as the exclamation of the traveller was of the 
name of Stony Stratford. 

Before Mr. Rose gave way to this intense value for 
Sir Patrick, and resolved to write a book, he should 
have inquired what accurate men there were about in 
society: and if he had once received the slightest no- 
tice of the existence of Mr.Samuel Heywood, serjeant- 
at-law, we are convinced he would have transfused 
into his own will and testament the feelings he deri- 
ved from that of Lord Marchmont, and devolved upon 
another executor the sacred and dangerous duty of 
vindicating Sir Patrick Hume. 

The life of Mr. Rose has been principally employed 
in the painful, yet perhaps necessary, duty of increa- 
sing the burdens of his fellow creatures. It has been 
a life of detail, onerous to the subject — onerous and 
lucrative to himself. It would be unfair to expect 
from one thus occupied any great depth of thought, 
or any remarkable graces of composition ; but we have 
a fair right to look for habits of patient research and 
scrupulous accuracy. We might naturally expect in- 
dustry in collecting facts, and fidelity in quoting them 
and hope, in the absence of commanding genius, to 
receive a compensation from the more humble and 
ordinary qualities of the rnind. How far this is the 



66 



WORKS OF THE REV. SIDNEY SMITH 



case, our subsequent remarks will enable the reader to 
judge. We shall not extend them to any great length, 
as we have before treated on the same subject in our 
review of Mr. Rose's work. Our great object at pre- 
sent is to abridge the observations of Sergeant Hey- 
wood. For Serjeant Heywood, though a most respect- 
able, honest, and enlightened man, really does require 
an abridger. He has not the talent of saying what he 
has to say quickly ; nor is he aware that brevity is in 
writing what charity is to all other virtues. Right- 
eousness is worth nothing without the one, nor author- 
ship without the other. But whoever will forgive 
this little defect will find in all his productions great 
learning, immaculate honesty, and the most scrupulous 
accuracy. Whatever detections of Mr. Rose's inac- 
curacies are made in this Review are to be entirely 
given to him ; and we confess ourselves quite aston- 
ished at their number and extent. 

'Among the modes of destroying persons (says Mr. Fox, 
p. 14,) in such a situation (i. e. monarchs deposed), there can 
be little doubt but that adopted by Cromwell and his adhe- 
rents is the least dishonourable. Edward II., Richard II., 
Henry IV., Edward V., had none of them survived their de- 
posal; but this was the first instance, in our history at least, 
when of such an act it could be truly said it was not done in 



What Mr. Rose can find in this sentiment to quar- 
rel with, we are utterly at a loss to conceive. If a 
human being is to be put to death unjustly, is it no 
mitigation of such a lot that the death should be pub- 
lic ? Is any thing better calculated to prevent secret 
torture and cruelty? And would Mr. Rose, in mercy 
to Charles, have preferred that red-hot iron should 
have been secretly thrust into his entrails ? — or that 
he should have disappeared as Pichegru and Toussaint 
have disappeared in our times ? The periods of the 
Edwards and Henrys were, it is true, barbarous pe- 
riods : but this is the very argument Mr. Fox uses. 
All these murders, he contends, were immoral and 
bad ; but that where the manner was the least objec- 
tionable, was the murder of Charles the First — be- 
cause it was public. And can any human being doubt, 
in the first place, that these crimes would be marked 
by less intense cruelty if they were public, and, se- 
condly, that they would become less frequent, where 
the perpetrators incurred responsibility, than if they 
were committed by an uncertain hand in secrecy and 
concealment ? There never was, in short, not only a 
more innocent, but a more obvious sentiment ; and to 
object to it hi the manner which Mr. Rose has done, 
is surely to love Sir Patrick Hume too much, — if there 
can be any excess in so very commendable a passion 
in the breast of a sole executor. 

Mr. Fox proceeds to observe, that { he who has dis- 
cussed this subject with foreigners, must have observ- 
ed, that the act of the execution of Charles, even in 
the minds of those who condemn it, excites more ad- 
miration than disgust.' If the sentiment is bad, let 
those who feel it answer for it. Mr. Fox only asserts 
the fact, and explains, without justifying it. The only 
question (as concerns Mr. Fox) is, whether such is, 
or is not, the feeling of foreigners ; and whether that 
feeling (if it exists) is rightly explained ? We have 
no doubt either of the fact or of the explanation. The 
conduct of Cromwell and his associates, was not to be 
excused in the main act ; but, in the manner, it was 
magnanimous. And among the servile nations of the 
Continent, it must naturally excite a feeling of joy and 
wonder, that the power of the people had for once 
been felt, and so memorable a lesson read to those 
whom they must naturally consider as the great op- 
pressors of mankind. 

The most unjustifiable point of Mr. Rose's accusa- 
tion, however, is still to come. < If such high praise,' 
says that gentleman, < was, in the judgment of Mr. 
Fox, due to Cromwell for the publicity of the proceed- 
ings against the king, how would he have found lan- 
guage sufficiently commendatory to express his admi- 
ration of the magnanimity of those who brought Lewis 
the Sixteenth to an open trial?' Mr. Rose accuses 
Mr. Fox, then, of approving the execution of Lewis 
the Sixteenth: but, on the 20tb of December, 1792, 



Mr. Fox said, in the House of Common in the pre- 
sence of Mr. Rose, 

' The proceedings with respect to the royal family of France, 
are so far from being magnanimity, justice, or mercy, that they 
are directly the reverse ; they are injustice, cruelty, and pusil- 
lanimity.' And afterwards declared his wish for an address to 
his majesty, to which he would add an expression ' of our ab- 
horrence of the proceedings against the royal family of France, 
in which, I have no doubt, we shall be supported by the whole 
country. If there can be any means suggested that will be 
better adapted to produce the unanimous concurrence of this 
House, and of all the country, with respect to the measure now 
under consideration in Paris, I should be obliged to any per- 
son for his better suggestion upon the subject ' Then, after 
stating that such address, especially if the Lords joined in it, 
must have a decisive influence in France, he added, ' I have 
said thus much in order to contradict one of the most cruel 
misrepresentations of what I have before said in our late de- 
bates ; and that my language may not be interpreted from the 
manner in which other gentlemen have chosen to answer it. I 
have spoken the genuine sentiments of my heart, and I anx- 
iously wish the House to come to some resolution upon the sub- 
ject.' And on the following day, when a copy of instructions 
sent to Earl Gower, signifying that he should leave Paris, was 
laid before the House of Commons, Mr. Fox said, ' he had heard 
it said, that the proceedings against the King of France are 
unnecessary. He would go a great deal farther, and say, he 
believed them to be highly unjust ; and not only repugnant to 
all the common feelings of mankind, but also contrary to all the 
fundamental principles of law.'— (p. 20, 21.) 

On Monday the 28th January, he said, 

' With regard to that part of the communication from his 
majesty, which related to the late detestable scene exhibited 
in a neighbouring country, he could not suppose there were 
two opinions in that House ; he knew they were all ready to 
declare their abhorrence of that abominable proceeding.'— 
(p. 21.) 

Two days afterwards, in the debate on the message, 
Mr. Fox pronounced the condemnation and execution 
of the king to be 

— ' an act as disgraceful as any that history recorded : and 
whatever opinions he might at any time have expressed in pri- 
vate conversation, he had expressed none certainly in that 
House on the justice of bringing kings to trial : revenge b^ing 
unjustifiable, and punishment useless, where it could not oper- 
ate either by way of prevention or example ; he did not view 
with less detestation the injustice and inhumanity that had 
been committed towards that unhappy monarch. Not only 
were the rules of criminal justice — rules that more than any 
other ought to be strictly observed — violated with respect to 
him : not only was he tried and condemned without existing 
law, to which he was personally amenable, and even contrary 
to laws that did actually exist, but the degrading circumstan 
ces of his imprisonment, the unnecessary and insulting asperity 
with which he had been treated, the total want of republican 
magnanimity in the whole transaction, (for even in that House 
it could be no offence to say, that there might be such a tiling 
as magnanimity in a republic,) added every aggravation to the 
inhumanity and injustice.' 

That Mr. Fox had held this language in the House 
of Commons, Mr. Rose knew perfectly well, when he 
accused that gentleman of approving the murder of the 
King of France. Whatever be the faults imputed to 
Mr. Fox, duplicity and hypocrisy were never among 
the number ; and no human being ever doubted but 
that Mr. Fox, in this instance, spoke his real senti- 
ments : but the love of Sir Patrick Hume is an over- 
whelming passion ; and no man who gives way to it, 
can ever say into what excesses he may be hurried. 
Non simul cuiquam conceditur, amare et sapere. 

The next point upon which Sergeant Heywood at- 
tacks Mr. Rose, is that of General Monk. Mr. Fox 
says of Monk, ' that he acquiesced in the insult so 
meanly put upon the illustrious corpse of Blake, under 
whose auspices and command he had performed the 
most creditable services of his life.' This story, Mr. 
Rose says, rests upon the authority of Neale, m his 
History of the Puritans. This is the first of many 
blunders made by Mr. Rose upon this particular topic : 
for Anthony Wood, in his Fasti Oxonienses, enumera- 
ting Blake among the bachelors, says, < His body was 
taken up, and, with others, buried in a pit in St. Mar- 
garet's church-yard adjoining, near to the back door of 
one of the prebendaries of Westminster, in which place 
it now remaineth, enjoying no other monument but 



CHARLES FOX. 



67 



what it reared by its valour, which time itself can 
hardly eflace.' But the difficulty is to find how the 
denial of Mr. Rose affects Mr. Fox's assertion. Mr. 
those admits that Blake's body was dug up by an order 
of the king ; and does not deny that it was done with 
the acquiescence of Monk. But if this be the case, 
Mr. Fox's position that Blake was insulted, and that 
Monk acquiesced in the insult, is clearly made out. 
Nor has Mr. Rose the shadow of an authority for say- 
ing that the cprpse of Blake was reinterred with great 
decorum. Kennet is silent upon the subject. We have 
already given Sergeant Heywood's quotation from 
Anthony Wood ; and this statement, for the present, 
rests entirely upon the assertion of Mr. Rose ; and 
upon that basis will remain to all eternity. 

Mr. Rose, who, we must say, on all occasions, 
through the whole of this book, makes the greatest 
parade of his accuracy, states that the bodies of 
Cromwell, Ireton, and Blake, were taken up at the 
same time ; whereas the fact is, that those of Crom- 
well and Ireton were taken up on the 26th of January, 
and that of Blake on the 10th of September, nearly 
nine months afterwards. It may appear frivolous to 
notice such errors as these ; but they lead to very 
strong suspicions hi a critic of history and of histori- 
ans. They show that those habits of punctuality, on 
the faith of which he demands implicit confidence 
from his readers, really do not exist ; they prove that 
such a writer will be exact only when he thinks the 
occasion of importance ; and as he himself is the only 
judge of thai importance, it is necessary to examine 
his proofs in every instance, and impossible to trust 
him anywhere. 

Mr. Rose remarks that, in the weekly paper entitled 
Mercurius Rusticus, Number 4, where an account is 
given of the disinterment of Cromwell and Ireton, not 
a syllable is said respecting the corpse of Blake. This 
is very true ; but the reason (which does not seem to 
have occurred to Mr. Rose) is, that Blake's corpse 
was not touched till six months afterwards. This is 
really a little too much. That Mr. Rose should quit 
his usual pursuits, erect himself into an historical 
critic, perch upon the body of the dead lion, impugn 
the accuracy of one of the greatest, as well as most 
accurate men of his time — and himself be guilty of 
such gross and unpardonable negligence, looks so very 
much like an insensibility to shame, that we should be 
loth to characterize his conduct by the severe epithets 
which it appears to merit, and which, we are quite 
certain, Sir Patrick, the defendee, would have been 
the first to bestow upon it. 

The next passage in Mr. Fox's work objected to, is 
that which charges Monk, at the trial of Argyle, ' with 
having produced letters of friendship and confidence 
to take away the life of a nobleman, in the zeal and 
cordiality of whose co-operation with him, proved by 
such documents, was the chief ground of his execu- 
tion.' This accusation, says Mr. Rose, rests upon the 
sole authority of Bishop Burnet ; and yet no sooner 
has he said this, than he tells us, Mr. Laing considers 
the bishop's authority to be confirmed by Cunningham 
and Baillie, both contemporary writers. Into Cun- 
ningham or Baillie Mr. Rose never looks to see whe- 
ther or not they do really confirm the authority of the 
bishop ; and so gross is his negligence, that the very 
misprint from Mr. Laing's work is copied, and page 
431 of Baillie is cited instead of 451 . If Mr. Rose had 
really taken the trouble of referring to these books, 
all doubt of the meanness and guilt of Monk must 
have been instantly removed. ' Monk was moved,' 
says Baillie, c to send down four or five of Argyle 's let- 
ters to himself and others, promising his full compliance 
with them, that the king should not reprieve him.'' Bail- 
lie's Letters, p. 451. 'He endeavoured to make his 
defence,' says Cunningham ; * but chiefly by the discove- 
ries of Monk was condemned of high treason, and lost 
his head.' — Cunningham's History, i. p. 13. 

Would it have been more than common decency re- 
quired, if Mr. Rose, who had been apprised of the ex- 
istence of these authorities, had had recourse to them, 
before he impugned the authority of Mr. Fox ? Or is 
it possible to read, without some portion of contempt, 
this slovenly and indolent corrector of supposed inac- 



curacies in a man, not only so much greater than him- 
self in his general nature, but a man who, as it turns 
out, excels Mr. Rose in his own little art of looking, 
searching, and comparing and is as much his supe- 
rior in the retail qualities which small people arrogate 
to themselves, as he was in every commanding faculty 
to the rest of his fellow creatures ? 

Mr. Rose searches Thurloe's State Papers ; but Ser- 
jeant Heywood searches them after Mr. Rose : and, 
by a series of the plainest references, proves the prob- 
ability there is that Argyle did receive letters which 
might materially have affected his life. 

To Monk's duplicity of conduct may be principally 
attributed the destruction of his friends, who were 
prevented, by their confidence in him, from taking 
measures to secure themselves. He selected those 
among them whom he thought fit for trial — sat as a 
commissioner upon their trial — and interfered not to 
save the lives even of those with whom he had lived 
in the habits of the greatest kindness. 

' I cannot,' says a witness of the most unquestionable autho- 
rity, ' I cannot forget one passage that I saw. Monk and his 
wife, before they were moved to the Tower, while they were 
yet prisoners at Lambeth House, came one evening to the 
garden, and caused them to be brought down, only to stare at 
them ; which was such a barbarism, for that man who betrayed 
so many poor men to death and misery, that never hurt him, 
but had honoured him, and trusted their lives and interests with 
him, to glut his bloody eyes with beholding them in their bon- 
dage, as no story can parallel the inhumanity of.' — (p. 83.) — 
Hutchinson's Memoirs, 378. 

This, however, is the man whom Mr. Fox, at the 
distance of a century and a half, may not mark with 
infamy, without incurring, from the candour of Mr 
Rose, the imputation of republican principles; — as if 
attachment to monarchy could have justified, in Monk, 
the coldness, cruelty, and treachery of his character, 
— as if the historian became the advocate, or the ene- 
my of any form of government, by praising the good, 
or blaming the bad men which it might produce. Ser- 
jeant Heywood sums up the whole article as follows : 

' Having examined and commented upon the evidence pro- 
duced by Mr. Rose, than which "it is hardly possible," he 
says, " to conceive that stronger could be formed in any case 
to establish a negative," we now safely assert that Mr. Fox had 
fully informed himself upon the subject before he wrote, and 
was amply justified in the condemnation of Monk, and the 
consequent severe censures upon him. It has been already 
demonstrated that the character of Monk had been truly gi- 
ven, when of him he said, " the army had fallen into the hands 
of one than whom a baser could not be found in its lowest 
ranks." The transactions between him and Argyle for a cer- 
tain period of time were such as must naturally, if not neces- 
sarily, have led them into an epistolary correspondence ; and 
it was in exact conformity with Monk's character and conduct 
to the regicides, that he should betray the letters written to 
him, in order to destroy a man whom he had, in the latter 
part of his command in Scotland, both feared and hated. If 
the fact of the production of these letters had stood merely on 
Bishop Burnet, we have seen that nothing has been produced 
by Mr. Rose and Dr. Campbell to impeach it ; on the contra- 
ry, an inquiry into the authorities and documents they have 
cited, strongly confirm it. But, as before observed, it is a sur- 
prising instance of Mr. Rose's indolence, that he should state 
the question to depend now, as it did in Dr. Campbell's time, 
on the bishop's authority solely. But that authority is, in 
itself, no light one. Burnet was almost eighteen years of age 
at the time of Argyle's trial ; he was never an unobserving 
spectator of public events ; he was probably at Edinburgh, 
and, for some years afterwards, remained in Scotland, with, 
ample means of information respecting events which had 
taken place so recently. Baillie seems, also to have been upon 
the spot, and expressly confirms the testimony of Burnet. To 
these must be added Cunningham, who, writing as a person 
perfectly acquainted with the circumstances of the transac- 
tion, says it was owing to the interference of Monk, who had 
been his great friend in Oliver's time, that he was sent back to 
Scotland, and brought to trial ; and that he was condemned 
chiefly by his discoveries. We may now ask, where is the 
improbability of this story, when related of such a man? and 
what ground there is for not giving credit t« a fact attested by 
three witnesses of veracity, each writing at a distance, and 
separate from each other ? In this instance Bishop Burnet is 
so confirmed, that no reasonable being who will attend to the 
subject, can doubt of the fact he relates being true ; and we 
shall hereafter prove that the general imputation against his 
accuracy made by Mr. Rose is totally without foundation. If 
facts so proved are not to be credited, historians may lay 



WORKS OF THE REV. SIDNEY SMITH. 



aside their pens, and every man must content himself with tho 
scanty pittance of knowledge he maybe able to collect for 
himself in the very limited sphere of his own immediate obser- 
vation.'— (p. 86-88.) 

This, we think, is conclusive enough : but we are 
happy to be enabled, out of our own store, to set this 
part of the question finally to rest, by an authority 
which Mr. Rose himself will probably admit to be de- 
cisive. Sir George Mackenzie, the great tory lawyer 
of Scotland in that day, and Lord Advocate to Charles 
II., through the greater part of his reign, was the lead- 
ing counsel for Argyle on the trial alluded to. In 
1678, this learned person, who was then Lord Advo- 
cate to Charles, published an elaborate treatise on the 
criminal law of Scotland ; in which, when treating of 
probation, or evidence, he observes, that missive let- 
ters, not written, but only signed by the party, should 
not be received in evidence ; and immediately adds, 
' And yet the Marquis of Argyle was convict of treason 

UPON LETTERS WRITTEN BY HIM TO GENERAL MONK ; 

these letters being only subscribed by him, and not 
holograph, and the subscription being proved per com- 
parationem literarum } which were very hard in other 
cases,' &c. — Mackenzie's Criminals, first edit. p. 524, 
Part II. tit. 25, § 3. Now this, we conceive, is neither 
more nor less than a solemn professional report of the 
case, — and leaves just as little room for doubt as to 
the fact, as if the original record of the trial had been 
recovered. 

Mr. Rose next objects to Mr. Fox's assertion, that 
1 the king kept from his cabal ministry the real state of 
his connection with France — and from some of them 
the secret of what he was pleased to call his religion ; ' 
and Mr. Fox doubts whether to attribute this conduct 
to the habitual treachery ot Charles, or to an appre- 
hension that his ministers might demand for them- 
selves some share of the French money ; which he was 
unwilling to give them. In answer to this conjecture, 
Mr. Rose quotes Barillon's Letters to Lewis XIV. to 
show that Charles's ministers were fully apprised of 
. his money transactions with France. The letters so 
quoted were, however, written seven years after the 
cabal ministry were in power — for Barillon did not come 
to England as Ambassador till 1677— and these letters 
were not written till after that period. Poor Sir Pat- 
rick — It was for thee and thy defence this book was 
written ! ! ! ! 

Mr. Fox has said, that from some of the ministers 
of the cabal the secret of Charles's religion was con- 
cealed. It was known to Arlington, admitted by Mr. 
Rose to be a concealed Catholic ; it was known to 
Clifford, an avowed Catholic : Mr. Rose admits it not 
to have been known to Buckingham, though he ex- 
plains the reserve, in respect to him, in a different 
way. He has not, however, attempted to prove that 
Lauderdale or Ashley were consulted ; — on the con- 
trary, in Colbert's letter of the 25th August, 1670, ci- 
ted by Mr. Rose, it is stated that Charles had proposed 
the trait'e simule, which should be a repetition of the 
former one in all things, except the article relative to 
the king's declaring himself a Catholic, and that the 
Protestant ministers, Buckingham, Ashley, Cooper, and 
Lauderdale, should be brought to be parties to it : — 
Can there be a stronger proof (asks Serjeant Hey- 
wood), that they were ignorant of the same treaty 
made the year before, and remaining then in force? 
Historical research is certainly not the peculiar talent 
of Mr. Rose ; and as for the official accuracy of which 
he is so apt to boast, we would have Mr. Rose to re- 
member, that the term official accuracy has of late 
days become one of very ambiguous import. Mr. 
Rose, we can see, would imply by it the highest pos- 
sible accuracy — as we see office pens advertised in the 
window of a shop, by way of excellence. The public 
reports of those, however, who have been appointed 
to look into the manner in which public offices are 
conducted, by no means justify this usage of the 
term ; — and we are not without apprehensions, that 
Dutch politeness, Carthaginian faith, Boeotian genius, 
and official accuracy, may be terms equally current in 
the world ; and that Mr. Rose may, without intending 
it, have contributed to make this valuable addition to 
the mass of our ironical phraseology 



Speaking of the early part of James's reign, Mr. Fox 
says, it is by no means certain that he had yet thoughts 
of obtaining for his religion any thing more than a 
complete toleration ; and if Mr. Rose had understood 
the meaning of the French word etablissement, one of 
his many incorrect corrections of Mr. Fox might have 
been spared. A system of religion is said to be estab- 
lished when it is enacted and endowed by Parliament ; 
but a toleration (as Serjeant Heywood observes) is 
established when it is recognized and protected by the 
supreme power. And in the letters *of Barillon, to 
which Mr. Rose refers for the justification of his at- 
tack upon Mr. Fox, it is quite manifest that M. is in this 
latter sense that the word etablissement is used ; an£ 
that the object in view was, not the substitution of the 
Catholic religion for the Established Church, but mere- 
ly its toleration. In the first letter cited by Mr. Rose, 
James says, that ' he knew well he should never be in 
safety unless liberty of conscience for them should be 
fully established in England.' The letter of the 24th 
of April is quoted by Mr. Rose, as if the French king 
had written, the establishment of the Catholic religion ; 
whereas the real words are, the establishment of the free 
exercise of the Catholic religion. The world are so in- 
veterately resolved to believe, that a man who has no 
brilliant talents must be accurate, that Mr. Rose, in 
referring to authorities, has a great and decided ad- 
vantage. He is, however, in point of fact, as lax and 
incorrect as a poet ; and it is absolutely necessary, in 
spite of every parade of line, and page, and number, 
to follow him in the most minute particular. The Ser- 
jeant like a bloodhound of the old breed, is always 
upon his track ; and always looks if there are any such 
passages in the page quoted, and if the passages are 
accurately quoted or accurately translated. Nor will 
he by any means be content with official accuracy, nor 
submit to be treated, in historical questions, as if he 
were hearing financial statements in the House of 
Commons. 

Barillon writes, in another letter to Lewis XIV. — 
' What your majesty has most besides at heart, that 
is to say, for the establishment of the free exercise of 
the Catholic religion.' On the 9th of May, Lewis 
writes to Barillon, that he is persuaded Charles will 
employ all his authority to establish the free excercise 
of the Catholic religion : he mentions also, in the 
same letter, the Parliament consenting to the free ex- 
ercise of our religion. On the loth of June, he writes 
to Barillon — ' There now remains only to obtain the re- 
peal of the penal laws in favour of the Catholics, and the 
free exercise of our religion in all his states.' Immedi- 
ately after Monmouth's execution, when his views of 
success must have been as lofty as they ever could 
have been, Lewis writes — ' It will be easy to the King 
of England, and as useful for the security of his reign 
as for the repose of his conscience, to re-establish the 
exercise of the Catholic religion.' In a letter of Baril- 
lon, July 16th, Sunderland is made to say, that the 
king would always be exposed to the indiscreet zeal 
•of those who would inflame the people against the 
Catholic religion, so long as it should not be more fully 
established. The French expression is, tant qu'elle ne 
sera pas plus epleinement tablie ; and this Mr. Rose has 
had the modesty to translate, till it shall be completely 
established, and to mark the passage with italics, as 
of the greatest importance to his argument. These 
false quotations and translations being detected, and 
those passages of early writers, from which Mr. Fox 
had made up his opinion, brought to light, it is not 
possible to doubt, but that the object of James, before 
Monmouth's defeat, was not the destruction of the 
Protestant, but the toleration of the Catholic religion ; 
and after the execution of Monmouth, Mr. Fox ad- 
mits, that he became more bold and sanguine upon the 
subject of religion. 

We do not consider those observations of Serjeant 
Heywood to be the most fortunate in his book, where 
he attempts to show the republican tendency of Mr. 
Rose's principles. Of any disposition to principles of 
this nature, we most heartily acquit that right honour- 
able gentleman. He has too much knowledge of man- 
kind to believe their happiness can be promoted in the 
stormy and tempestuous regions of republicanism 



CHARLES FOX. 



and, besides this, that system of slender pay, and de- 
ficient perquisites, to which the subordinate agents of 
government are confined in republics, is much too 
painful to be thought of for a single instant. 

We are afraid of becoming tedious by the enu- 
meration of blunders into which Mr. Rose has fallen, 
and which Serjeant Heywood has detected. But the 
burthen of this sole executor's song is accuracy— his 
own official accuracy — and the little dependence which 
is to be placed on the accuracy of Mr. Fox. We will 
venture to assert, that, in the whole of his work, he 
has not detected Mr. Fox in one single error. Wheth- 
er Serjeant Heywood has been more fortunate with 
Mr. Rose, might be determined, perhaps, with suffi- 
cient certainty, by our previous extracts from his re- 
marks. But for some indulgent readers, these may 
not seem enough : and we must proceed in the task, 
till we have settled Mr. Rose's pretensions to accura- 
cy on a still firmer foundation. And if we be thought 
minutely severe, let it be remembered that Mr. Rose 
is himself an accuser; and if there is justice upon 
earth, every man has a right to pull stolen goods out 
of the pocket of him who cries, l Stop thief! ' 

In the story which Mr. Rose states of the seat in 
Parliament sold for five pounds (Journal of the Com- 
mons, vol. v.), he is wrong, both in the sum and the 
volume. The sum is four pounds ; and it is told, not 
in the fifth volume, but the first. Mr. Rose states, 
that a perpetual excise was granted to the crown, iii 
lieu of the profits of the court of wards ; and adds, 
that the question in favour of the crown was carried 
by a majority of two. The real fact is, that the half 
only of an excise upon certain articles was granted to 
government in lieu of these profits; and this grant 
was carried without a division. An attempt was made 
to grant the other half, and this was negatived by a 
majority of two. The Journals are open ; — Mr. Rose 
reads them ; — he is officially accurate. What can the 
meaning be of these most extraordinary mistakes ? 

Mr. Rose says that, in 1679, the writ de hceretico 
comburendo had been a dead letter for more than a 
century. It would have been extremely agreeable to 
Mr. Bartholomew Legate, if this had been the case ; 
for, in 1612, he was burnt at Smithfield for being an 
Arian. Mr. Wightman would probably have partici- 
pated in the satisfaction of Mr. Legate ; as he was 
burnt also, the same year, at Lichfield, for the same 
offence. With the same correctness, this scourge of 
historians makes the Duke of Lauderdale, who died 
in 1682, a confidential adviser of James II. after his 
accession in 1689. In page 13, he quotes, as written 
by Mr. Fox, that which was written by Lord Holland. 
This, however, is a familiar practice with him. Ten 
pages afterwards, in Mr. Fox's History, he makes the 
same mistake. ' Mr. Fox added' — whereas it was 
jLwd Holland that added. The same mistake again 
in p. 147 of his own book ; and after this, he makes 
Mr. Fox the person who selected the appendix of 
Barillon's papers ; whereas it is particularly stated in 
the preface to the History, that this appendix was 
selected by Laing. 

Mr. Rose affirmr,, that compassing to levy war 
against the king was made high treason by the sta- 
tute of 25 Edward the Third ; and, in support of this 
affirmation, he cites Coke and Blackstone. His stern 
antagonist, a professional man, is convinced he has 
read neither. The former says, ' a compassing to levy 
war is no treason, (Inst. 3., p. 9.),; and Blacksone, l a 
bare conspiracy to levy war does not amount to this 
species of treason.' (Com. iv. p. 82.) This really 
does not look as if the Serjeant had made out his 
assertion. 

Of the bill introduced in 1685, for the preservation 
of the person of James II., Mr. Rose observes — < Mr. 
Fox has not told us for which of our modern statutes 
this bill was used as a model ; and it will he difficult 
lor any one to show such an instance.' It might have 
been thought, that no prudent man would have made 
such a challenge, without a tolerable certainty ot the 
ground upon which it was made. Serjeant Heywood 
answers the challenge by citing the 36 Geo. III. c. 7, 
whicn is a mere copy of the act of Jrmes. 

In the fifth section of Mr. Rose's vork is contained 



his grand attack upon Mr. Fox for his abuse of SiK 
Patrick Hume ; and his observations upon this point 
admit of a fourfold answer. 1st, Mr. Fox does not 
use the words quoted by Mr. Rose ; 2dly, He makes 
no mention whatever of Sir Patrick Hume in the pas- 
sage cited by Mr. Rose ; 3dly, Sir Patrick JHume is 
attacked by nobody in that history ; 4thly, If he had 
been so attacked he would have deserved it. The 
passage from Mr. Fox is this : — 

* In recounting the failure of his expedition, it is impos 
sible for him to touch upon what he deemed the miscon- 
duct of his friends ; and this is the subject upon which, of 
all others, his temper must have been most irritable. A 
certain description of friends (the words describing them 
are omitted) were all of them, without exception, his great- 
est enemies, both to betray and destroy him : . and 

and (the names again omitted) were the greatest cause of 
his rout, and his being taken, though not designedly, he 
acknowledges, but by ignorance, cowardice, and faction. 
This sentence had scarce escaped him, when, notwithstand- 
ing the qualifying words with which his candour has ac- 
quitted the last mentioned persons of intentional treachery, 
it appeared toe harsh to his gentle nature ; and, declaring 
himself displeased with the hard epithets he had used, he 
desires that they may be put out of any account that is to 
be given of these transactions.' — Heywood, p. 365, 366. 

Argyle names neither the description of friends who 
were his greatest enemies, nor the two individuals who 
were the principal cause of the failure of his scheme. 
Mr. Fox leaves the blanks as he finds them. But two 
notes are added by the editor, which Mr. Rose might 
have observed are marked with an E. In the latter of 
them we are told, that Mr. Fox observes, in a private 
letter, ' Cochrane and Hume certainly filled up the two 
principal blanks.' But is this communication of a pri- 
vate letter any part of Mr. Fox's history ? And would 
it not have been equally fair in Mr. Rose to have com- 
mented upon any private conversation of Mr. Fox, 
and then have called it his history ? Or, if Mr. Fox 
had filled up the blanks in the body of his history, 
does it follow that he adopts Argyle's censure because 
he shows against whom it is levelled ? Mr. Rose has 
described the charge against Sir Patrick Hume to be, 
of faction, cowardice, and treachery. Mr. Rose has 
more than once altered the terms of a proposition be- 
fore he has proceeded to answer it ; and, in this in- 
stance, the charge of treachery against Sir Patrick 
Hume is not made either in Argyle's letter, Mr. Fox's 
text, or the editor's note, or any where but in the im- 
agination of Mr. Rose. The sum of it all is, that Mr. 
Rose first supposes the relation of Argyle's opinion to 
be the expression of the relator's opinion, that Mr. 
Fox adopts Argyle's insinuations because he explains 
them ; — then he looks upon a quotation from a private 
letter, made by the editor, to be the same as if includ- 
ed in a work intended for publication by the author ; — 
then he remembers that he is the sole executor of Sir 
Patrick's grandson, whose blank is so filled up ;— and 
goes on blundering and blubbering, — grateful and in- 
accurate, — teeming with false quotations and friendly 
recollections to the conclusion of his book. — Multa 
gemens ignominiam. 

Mr. Rose came into possession of the Earl of March- 
mont's papers, containing, among other things, the 
narrative of Sir Patrick Hume. He is very severe 
upon Mr. Fox for not having been more diligent in 
searching for original papers ; and observes, that if 
any application had been made to him (Mr. Rose,) 
this narrative should have been at Mr. Fox's service. 
We should be glad to know, if Mr. Rose saw a per- 
son tumbled into a ditch, whether he would wait for 
a regular application till he pulled him out? Or, if 
he happened to espy the lost piece of silver for which 
the good woman was diligently sweeping the house, 
would he wait for formal interrogation before he im- 
parted his discovery, and suffer the lady to sweep on 
till the question had been put to him in the most 
solemn forms of politeness? The established prac- 
tice, we admit, is to apply, and to apply vigorously 
and incessantly, for sinecure places and pensions — or 
they cannot be had. This is true enough. But did 
any human being ever think of carrying this practice 
into literature, and compelling another to make inter- 
est for papers essential to the good conduct of hi* 



WORKS OF THE REV. SIDNEY SMITH. 



undertaking? We are perfectly astonished at Mr. 
Rose's conduct in this particular; and should have 
thought that the ordinary exercise of his good nature 
■would have led him to a very different way of acting. 

1 On the whole, and upon the most attentive considera- 
tion of every thing which has been written upon the sub- 
ject, there does not appear to have been any intention 
of applying torture in the case of the Earl of Argyle.' 
(Rose, p. 182.) If this every thing had included the 
following extract from Barillon, the above cited, and 
v«ry disgraceful inaccuracy of Mr. Rose would have 
been spared. <■ The Earl of Argyle has been executed 
at Edinburgh, and has left a full confession in writing, 
in which he discovers all those who have assisted him 
with money, and have aided his designs. This has 
saved him from the torture.' And Argyle, in his letter 
to Mrs. Smith, confesses he has made discoveries. 
In his very inaccurate history of torture in the south- 
em part of this island, Mr. Rose says, that except in 
the case of Felton — in the attempt to introduce the 
civil law in Henry VI. 's reign, — and in some cases of 
treason in Mary's reign, torture was never attempted 
in this country. The fact, however, is, that in the 
reign of Henry VIII., Anne Askew was tortured by 
the chancellor himself. Simson was tortured in 1558 ; 
Francis Throgmorton in 1571 ; Charles Baillie, and 
Banastie, the Duke of Norfolk's servant, Avere tortured 
in 1581 ; Campier, the Jesuit, was put upon the rack ; 
and Dr. Astlow is supposed to have been racked in 
1558. So much for Mr. Rose as the historian of pun- 
ishments. We have seen him, a few pages before, at 
the stake, — where he makes quite as bad a figure as 
he does now upon the rack. Precipitation and error 
are his foibles. If he were to write the history of 
sieges, he would forget the siege of Troy ; — if he were 
making a fist of poets, he would leave out Virgil : — 
Caesar would not appear in his catalogue of generals ; 
and Newton would be overlooked in his collection of 
eminent mathematicians. 

In some cases, Mr. Rose is to be met only with flat 
denial. Mr. Fox does not call the soldiers who were 
defending James against Argyle authorized assassins ; 
but he uses that expression against the soldiers who 
were murdering the peasants, and committing every 
sort of licentious cruelty in the twelve counties given 
up to military execution ; and this Mr. Rose must 
have known, by using the most ordinary diligence in 
the perusal of the text, — and would have known it in 
any other history than that of Mr. Fox. 

* Mr. Rose, in his concluding paragraph, boasts of Ms 
speaking " impersonally," and he hopes it will be allowed 
justly, when he makes a general observation respecting 
the proper province of history. But the last sentence evi- 
dently shows that, though he might be speaking justly, he 
was not speaking impersonally, if by that word is meant, 
without reference to any person. His words are, " But 
history cannot connect itself with party, without forfeiting 
its name ; without departing from the truth, the dignity, 
and the usefulness of its functions." After the remarks he 
has made in some of his preceding pages, and the apology 
he has offered for Mr. Fox, in his last preceding paragraph, 
for having been mistaken in his view of some leading 
points, there can be no difficulty in concluding, that this 
general observation is meant to be applied to the historical 
work. The charge intended to be insinuated must be, that, 
in Fox's hands, history has forfeited the name by being 
connected with party ; and has departed from the truth, 
the dignity, and the usefulness of its functions. It were to 
be wished that Mr. Rose had explained himself more fully ; 
for, after assuming that the application of his obser- 
vation is too obvious to be mistaken, there still remains 
some difficulty with respect to its meaning. If it is con- 
fined to such publications as are written under the title of 
histories, but are intended to serve the purposes of a party ; 
and truth is sacrificed, and facts perverted, to defend and 
give currency to their tenets, we do not dispute its pro- 
priety ; but, if that is the character which Mr. Rose would 
give to Mr. Fox's labours, he has not treated him with can- 
dour, or even common justice. Mr. Rose has never, in 
any one instance, intimated that Mr. Fox has wilfully de- 
parted from truth, or strayed from the proper province of 
history, for the purpose of indulging his private or party 
feelings. But, if Mr. Rose intends that his observation 
should be applied to all histories, the authors of which have 
felt strongly the influence of political connections and 
principles, what must become of most of the histories of 
England? Is the title of historian to be denied to Mr 



Hume ? and in what class are to be placed Echard, Rennet, 
Rapin, Dalrymple, or Macpherson ? In this point of view 
the principle laid down is too broad. A person, though 
connected with party, may write an impartial history of 
events which occurred a century before ; and, till this last 
entence, Mr. Rose has not ventured to intimate that Mr. 
Fox has not done so. On the contrary, he has declared his 
pprobation of a great portion of the work ; and his at- 
tempts to discover material errors in the remainder have 
uniformly failed in every particular. If it might be as- 
sumed that there existed in the book no faults, besides 
those which the scrutinizing eye of Mr. Rose has dis- 
covered, it might be justly deemed the most perfect work 
that ever came from the press ; for not a single deviation 
from the strictest duty of an historian has been pointed out; 
while instances of candour and impartiality present them- 
selves in almost every page ; and Mr. Rose himself has 
acknowledged and applauded many of them.'— (pp. 422 — 
424.) 

These extracts from both books are sufficient to 
show the nature of Serjeant Heywood's examination of 
Mr. Rose, — the boldness of this latter gentleman's as- 
sertions, — and the extreme inaccuracy of the research- 
es upon which these assertions are founded. If any 
credit could be gained from such a book as Mr. Rose 
has published, it could be gained from accuracy alone. 
Whatever the execution of his book had been, the 
world would have remembered the infinite disparity of 
the two authors, and the long political opposition hi 
which they lived — if that, indeed, can be called oppo- 
sition, where the thunderbolt strikes, and the clay 
yields. They would have remembered also that Hec- 
tor was dead ; and that every cowardly Grecian could 
now thrust his spear into the hero's body. But still, 
if Mr. Rose had really succeeded in exposing the inac- 
curacy of Mr. Fox, — if he could have fairly shown that 
authorities were overlooked, or slightly examined, or 
wilfully perverted, — the incipient feelings to which 
such a controversy had given birth must have yielded 
to the evidence of facts ; and Mr. Fox, however quali 
fied in other particulars, must have appeared totally 
defective in that laborious industry and scrupulous 
good faith so indispensable to every historian. But he 
absolutely comes out of the contest not worse even in 
a single tooth or nail — unvilified even by a wrong date 

without one misnomer proved upon him — immacu- 
late in his years and days of the month — blameless to 
the most musty and limited pedant that ever yellowed 
himself amidst rolls and records. 

But how fares it with his critic ? He rests his credit 
with the world as a man of labour, — and he turns out 
to be a careless inspector of proofs, and an historical 
sloven. The species of talent which he pretends to is 
humble < — and he possesses it not. He has not done 
that which all men may do, and which every man 
ought to do, who rebukes his superiors for not doing 
it. His claims, too, it should be remembered, to these 
every-day qualities, are by no means enforced with 
gentleness and humility. He is a braggadocio of mi- 
nuteness — a swaggering chronologer ; a man bristling 
up with small facts — prurient with dates — wantoning 
in obsolete evidence — loftily dull, and haughty in his 
drudgery ; — and yet all this is pretence. Drawing is 
no very unusual power in animals; but he cannot 
draw ; — he is not even the ox which he is so fond of 
being. In attempting to vilify Mr. Fox, he has only 
shown us that there was no labour from which that 
great man shrunk, and that no object connected with 
his history was too minute for his investigation. He 
has thoroughly convinced us that Mr. Fox was as in- 
dustrious, and as accurate, as if these were the only 
qualities upon which he had ever rested his hope of 
fortune or of fame. Such, indeed, are the customary 
results when little people sit down to debase the char- 
acters of great men, and to exalt themselves upon the 
ruins of what they have pulled down. They only pro- 
voke a spirit of inquiry, which places everything in its 
true light and magnitude, — shows those who appear 
little to be still less, and displays new and unexpected 
excellence in others who were before known to excel. 
These are the usual consequences of such attacks. 
The fame of Mr. Fox has stood this, and will stand 
much ruder shocks. 

Non hietnes illam, nonfidbra neque imbres 
Convellunt ; immota manet, multosqueper annos 
Multa virum volens durando sacula vincit. 



MAD QUAKERS. 



MAD QUAKERS. (Edinburgh Review, 1814.) 

Description of the Retreat, an Institution near York, for 
Insane Persons of the Society of Friends. Containing an 
Account of its Origin and Progress, the Modes of Treatment, 
anda Statement of Cases. By Samuel Tuke. York, 1813. 

The Quakers always seem to succeed in any institu- 
tion which they undertake. The gaol at Philadelphia 
will remain a lasting monument of their skill and pa- 
tience ; and, in the plan and conduct of this retreat for 
the insane, they have evinced the same wisdom and 
perseverance. 

The present account is given us by Mr. Tuke, a re- 
spectable tea-dealer, living in York,— and given in a 
maimer which we are quite sure the most opulent and 
important of his customers could not excel. The long 
account of the subscription, at the beginning of the 
book, is evidently made tedious for the Quaker mar- 
ket ; and Mr. Tuke is a little too much addicted to 
quoting. But, with these trifling exceptions, his book 
does him very great credit ;— it is full of good sense 
and humanity, right feelings and rational views. The 
retreat for insane Quakers is situated about a mile 
from the city of York, upon an eminence commanding 
the adjacent country, and in the midst of a garden and 
fields belonging to the institution. The great princi- 
ple on which it appears to be conducted is that of kind- 
ness to the patients. It does not appear to them, be- 
cause a man is mad upon one particular subject, that 
he is to be considered in a state of complete mental 
degradation, or insensible to the feelings of kindness 
and gratitude. When a madman does not know what 
he is bid to do, the shortest method, to be sure, is to 
knock him down ; and straps and chains are the spe- 
cies of prohibition which ure the least frequently dis- 
regarded. But the Society of Friends seem rather to 
consult the interest of the patient than the ease of his 
keeper ; and to aim at the government of the insane, 
by creating in them the kindest disposition towards 
those who have the command over them. Nor can 
anything be more wise, humane, or interesting, than 
the strict attention to the feelings of their patients 
which seems to prevail in their institutions. The fol- 
lowing specimens of their disposition upon this point 
we have great pleasure in laying before our readers : — 

« The smallness of the court,' says Mr Tuke, ' would be a 
serious defect, if itwas not generally compensated by taking- 
such patients as are suitable into the garden ; and by fre- 
quent excursions into the city, or the surrounding country, 
and into the fields of the institution. One of these is sur- 
rounded by a walk interspersed with trees and shrubs. 

« The superintendent has also endeavoured to furnish a 
source of amusement to those patients whose walks are ne- 
cessarily more circumscribed, by supplying each of the 
courts with a number of animals, such as rabbits, sea gulls, 
hawks, and poultry. These creatures are generally very 
familiar with the patients ; and it is believed they are not 
only the means of innocent pleasure, but that the inter- 
course with them sometimes tends to awaken the social feel- 
ings.'— (p. 95, 96.) 

Chains are never permitted at the Retreat ; nor is it 
left to the option of the lower attendants when they 
are to impose an additional degree of restraint upon 
the patients ; and this compels them to pay attention 
to the feelings of the patients, and to attempt to gain 
an influence over them by kindness. Patients who are 
not disposed to injure themselves are merely confined 
by the strait waistcoat, and left to walk about the 
room, or lie down on the bed, at pleasure ; and even in 
those cases where there is a strong tendency to self- 
destruction, as much attention is paid to the feelings 
and ease of the patient as is consistent with his 
safety. 

« Except incases of violent mania, which is far frombeing 
a frequent occurrence at the Retreat, coercion, when requi- 
site, is considered as a necessary evil ; that is, it is thought 
abstractedly to have a tendency to retard the cure, by oppo- 
sing the influence of the moral remedies employed. It ic 
therefore used very sparingly ; and the superintendent has 
often assured me, that he would rather run some risk than 
have recourse to restraint where it was not absolutely ne- 
cessary, except in those cases where it was likely to have a 
ealutary moral tendency. 

< I feel no small satisfaction in stating, upon the author- 



ity of the superintendents, that during the last year, In 
which the number of patients has generally been sixty-four, 
there has not been occasion to seclude, on an average, two 
patients at one time. I am also able to state, that although 
it is occasionally necessary to restrain, by the waistcoat, 
straps, or other means, several patients at one time, yet that 
the average number so restrained does not exceed four, in- 
cluding those who are secluded. 

* The safety of those who attend upon the insane is cer- 
tainly an object of great importance ; but it is worthy of in- 
quiry whether it may not be attained without materially in- 
terfering with another object,— the recovery of the patient. 
It may also deserve inquiry, whether the extensive practice 
of coercion, which obtains in some institutions, does not 
arise from erroneous views of the character of insane per- 
sons ; from indifference to their comfort ; or from having 
rendered coercion necessary by previous unkind treatment. 
' The power of judicious kindness over this unhappy class of 
society is much greater than is generallyimagined. It i6, per- 
haps, not too much to apply to kind treatment the words of our 
great poet, — 

" She can unlock 
The clasping charm, and thaw the numbing spell." — MiLTON. 
' In no instance has this power been more strikingly dis- 
played, or exerted with more beneficial effects, than in those 
deplorable cases in which the patient refuses to take food. 
The kind persuasions and ingenious arts of the superintendents 
have been singularly successful in overcoming this distressing 
symptom ; and very few instances now occur in which it is 
necessary to employ violent means for supplying the patient 
witli food. 

' Some patients, who refuse to partake of the family meals, 
are induced to eat by being taken into the larder, and there 
allowed to help themselves. Some are found willing to eat 
when food is left with them in their rooms, or when they can 
obtain it unobserved by their attendants. Others, whose de- 
termination is stronger, are frequently induced, by repeated 
persuasion, to take a small quantity of nutritious liquid ; and it 
is equally true in these as in general cases, that every breach 
of resolution weakens the power and disposition to resistance. 
' Sometimes, however, persuasion seems to strengthen the 
unhappy determination. In one of these cases the attendants 
were completely wearied with their endeavours ; and, on remo- 
ving the food, one of them took a piece of the meat which had 
been repeatedly offered to the patient, and threw it under the 
fire-grate, at the same time exclaiming that she should not have 
it. The poor creature, who seemed governed by the rule of 
contraries, immediately rushed from her seat, seized the meat 
from the ashes, and devoured it. For a short time she was indu- 
ced to eat, by the attendants availing themselves of this contrary 
disposition ; but it was soon rendered unnecessary by the remo- 
val of this unhappy feature of the disorder.' — (p. 166, 167, 168, 
169.) 

When it is deemed necessary to apply any mode of 
coercion, such an overpowering force is employed as 
precludes all possibility of successful resistance ; and 
most commonly, therefore, extinguishes every idea of 
making any at all. An attendant upon a madhouse ex- 
poses himself to some risk — and to some he ought to 
expose himself, or he is totally unfit for his situation. 
If the security of the attendants were the only object, 
the situation of the patients would soon become truly 
desperate. The business is, not to risk nothing, but 
not to risk too much. The generosity of the Quakers, 
and their courage in managing mad people, ixe placed, 
by this institution, in a very striking point of view. 
This cannot be better illustrated than by the two fol- 
lowing cases : 

' The superintendent was one day walking in a field adja- 
cent to the house, in company with a patient who was apt to 
be vindictive on very slight occasions. An exciting circum- 
stance occurred. The maniac retired a few paces, and seized 
a large stone, which he immediately held up, as in the act of 
throwing at his companion. The superintendent, in no degree 
ruffled, fixed his eye upon the patient, and in a resolute tone 
of voice, at the same time advancing, commanded him to lay 
down the stone. As he approached, the hand of the lunatic 
gradually sunk from its threatening position, and permitted 
the stone to drop to the ground. He then submitted to be 
quietly led to his apartment.' 

' Some years ago, a man, about thirty-four years of age, of 
almost herculean size and figure, was brought to the house. 
He had been afflicted several times before ; and so constantly, 
during the present attack, had he been kept chained, that his 
clothes were contrived to be taken off and put on by means of 
strings, without removing his manacles. They were, howe- 
ver, taken off when he entered the Retreat, and he was ush- 
ered into the apartment where the superintendents were sup 
ping. He was calm : his attention appeared to be arrested by 
his new situation. He was desired to join in the repast, during 
which he behaved with tolerable propriety. After it was cob- 



72 



WORKS OF THE REV. SIDNEY SMITH. 



eluded, the superintendent conducted him to his apartment, 
and told him the circumstances on which his treatment would 
depend ; that it was his anxious wish to make every inhabi- 
tant in the house as comfortable as possible ; and that he sin- 
cerely hoped the patient's conduct would render it unneces- 
sary to have recourse to coercion. The maniac was sensible 
of the kindness of his treatment. He promised to restrain 
himself; and he so completely succeeded, that, during his 
stay, no coercive means were ever employed towards him. 
This case affords a striking example of the efficacy of mild 
treatment The patient was frequently very vociferous, and 
threatened his attendants, who, in their defence, were very 
desirous of restraining him by the jacket. The superintend- 
ent on these occasions went to his apartment : and though the 
first sight of him seemed rather to increase the patient's irri- 
tation, yet, after sitting some time quietly beside him, the vio- 
lent excitement subsided, and he would listen with attention to 
the persuasions and arguments of his friendly visitor. After 
such conversations the patient was generally better for some 
days or a week ; and in about four months he was discharged, 
perfectly recovered. 

' Can it be doubted that, in this case, the disease had been 
greatly exasperated by the mode of treatment 1 or that the 
subsequent kind treatment had a great tende^cv to promote 
his recovery?'— (p. 172, 173, 146, 147.) 

And yet, in spite of this apparent contempt of dan- 
ger, for eighteen years not a single accident has hap- 
pened to the keepers. 

In the day room the sashes are made of cast-iron, 
and give to the building the security of bars, without 
their unpleasant appearance. With the same lauda- 
ble attention to the feelings of these poor people, the 
straps of their strait waistcoats are made of some 
showy colour, and are not infrequently considered by 
them as ornaments. No advantage whatever has 
been found to arise from reasoning with patients on 
their particular delusions : it is found rather to exaspe- 
rate than convince them. Indeed, that state of mind 
would hardly deserve the name of insanity where ar- 
gument was sufficient for the refutation of error. 

The classification of patients according to their de- 
gree of convalescence is very properly attended to at 
the Retreat, and every assistance given to returning 
reason by the force of example. We were particular- 
ly pleased with the following specimens of Quaker 
sense and humanity : — 

' The female superintendent, who possesses an uncommon 
share of benevolent activity, and who has the chief manage- 
ment of the female patients, as well as of the domestic depart- 
ment, occasionally gives a general invitation to the patients to 
a tea-party. All who attend dress in their best clothes, and 
vie with each other in politeness and propriety. The best 
fare is provided, and the visitors are treated with all the atten- 
tion of strangers. The evening generally passes in the great- 
est harmony and enjoyment. It rarely happens that any 
unpleasant circumstance occurs. The patients controul, in a 
wonderful degree, their different propensities ; and the scene 
is at once curious and affectingly gratifying. 

' Some of the patients occasionally pay visits to their friends 
in the city ; and female visitors are appointed every month by 
the committee to pay visits to those of their own sex, to con- 
verse with them, and to propose to the superintendents, or the 
committee, any improvements which may occur to them. 
The visitors sometimes take tea with the patients, who are 
much gratified with the attention of their friends, and mostly 
behave with propriety. 

' It will be necessary here to mention that the visits of form- 
er intimate friends have frequently been attended with dis- 
advantage to the patients, except when convalescence had so 
far advanced as to afford a prospect of a speedy return to the 
bosom of society. It is, however, very certain that, as soon as 
reason begins to return, the conversation of judicious indiffer- 
ent persons greatly increases the comfort, and is considered 
almost essential to the recovery of many patients. On this 
account the convalescents of every class are frequently intro- 
duced into the society of the rational parts of the family. 
They are also permitted to sit up till the usual time for the 
family to retire to rest, and are allowed as much liberty as 
their state of mind will permit.' — (p. 178, 179.) 

To the effects of kindness in the Retreat are super- 
added those of constant employment. The female 
patients are employed as much as possible in sewing, 
knitting, and domestic affairs ; and several of the con- 
valescents assist the attendants. For the men are se- 
lected those species of bodily employments most 
agreeable to the patient, and most opposite to the il- 
lusions of his disease. Though the effect of fear is 



not excluded from the institution, yet the love of es- 
teem is considered as a still more powerful principle 

' That fear is not the only motive which operates in produ- 
cing self-restraint in the minds of maniacs, is evident from its 
being often exercised in the presence of strangers who are 
merely passing through the house ; and which, I presume, can 
only be accounted for from that desire of esteem which has 
been stated to be a powerful motive to conduct. 

' It is, probably, from encouraging the action of this princi- 
ple, that so much advantage has been found in this institution, 
from treating the patient as much in the manner of a ra- 
tional being as the state of his mind will possibly allow. The 
superintendent is particularly attentive to this point in his 
conversation with the patients. He introduces such topics as 
he knows will most interest them ; and which at the same time 
allows them to display their knowledge to the greatest advan- 
tage. If the patient is an agriculturist, he asks him questions 
relative to his art ; and frequently consults him upon any 
occasion in which his knowledge may be useful. I have heart? 
one of the worst patients in the house, who, previously to hiz 
indisposition, had been a considerable grazier, give very sen- 
sible directions for the treatment of a diseased cow. 

' These considerations are undoubtedly very material, as 
they regard the comfort of insane persons ; but they are of far 
greater importance as they relate to the cure of the disorder. 
The patient, feeling himself of some consequence, is induced 
to support it by the exertion of his reason, and by restraining 
those dispositions which, if indulged, would lessen the respect- 
ful treatment he receives, or lower his character in the eyes of 
his companions and attendants. 

' They who are unacquainted with the character of insane 
persons are very apt to converse with them in a childish, or, 
which is worse, in a domineering manner ; and hence it has 
been frequently remarked by the patients at the Retreat, that 
a stranger who has visited them seemed to imagine they were 
children. 

' The natural tendency of such treatment is to degrade the 
mind of the patient, and to make him indifferent to those moral 
feelings which, under judicious direction and encouragement, 
are found capable, in no small degree, to strengthen the power of 
self-restraint, and which render the resort to coercion in many 
cases unnecessary. Even when it is absolutely requisite to 
employ coercion, if the patient promises to control himself on 
its removal, great confidence is generally placed upon his 
word. I have known patients, such is their sense of honour 
and moral obligation under this kind of engagement, hold for 
a long time a successful struggle with the violent propensities 
of their disorder ; and such attempts ought to be sedulously 
encouraged by the attendant. 

' Hitherto, we have chiefly considered those modes of indu- 
cing the patient to control his disordered propensities which 
arise from an application to the general powers of the mind ; 
but considerable advantage may certainly be derived, in this 
part of moral management, from an acquaintance with the pre- 
vious habits, manners, and prejudices of the individual. Nor 
must we forget to call to our aid, in endeavouring to promote 
self-restraint, the mild but powerful influence of the precepts.of 
our holy religion. Where these have beeii strongly imbued in 
early life, they become little less than principles of our nature : 
and their restraining power is frequently felt, even under the 
delirious excitement of insanity. To encourage the influence 
of religious principles over the mind of the insane is considered 
of great consequence as a means of cure. Fortius purpose, as 
Avell as for others still more important, it is certainly right to 
promote in the patient an attention to his accustomed modes ot 
paying homage to his Maker. • 

' Many patients attend the religious meetings of the society 
held in the city; and most of them are assembled, on a first 
day afternoon, at which time the superintendent reads to them 
several chapters in the Bible. A profound silence generally 
ensues ; during which, as well as at the time of reading, it is 
very gratifying to observe their orderly conduct, and the de- 
gree in which those who are much disposed to action restrain 
their different propensities.' — (p. 158 — 161.) 

Very little dependence is to be placed on medicine 
alone for the cure of insanity. The experience, at 
least, of this well-governed institution is very unfavour- 
able to its efficacy. Where an insane person happens 
to be diseased in body as well as mind, medicine is not 
only of as great importance to him as to any other 
person, but much greater ; for the diseases of the body 
are commonly found to aggravate those of the mind ; 
but against mere insanity, unaccompanied by bodily 
derangement, it appears to be almost powerless. 

There is one remedy, however, which is very fre- 
quently employed at the Retreat, and which appears 
to have been attended with the happiest effect, and 
that is the warm bath.— the least recommended, and 
the most important, of all remedies in melancholy 
madness. Under this mode of treatment, the number 



AMERICA 



73 



of recoveries, in cases of melancholia, has been very 
Unusual ; though no advantage has been found from it 
in the case of mania. 

At the end of the work is given a table of all the 
cases which have occurred in the institution from its 
first commencement. It appears that, from its open- 
ing in the year 1796 to the end of 1811, 149 patients 
have been admitted. Of this number 61 have been re- 
cent cases : 31 of these patients have been maniacal ; 
of whom 2 died, 6 remain, 21 have been discharged 
perfectly recovered, 2 so much improved as not to re- 
quire further confinement. The remainder, 30 recent 
cases, have been those of melancholy madness; of 
whom 5 have died, 4 remain, 19 have been discharged 
cured, and 2 so much improved as not to require fur- 
ther confinement. The old cases, or, as they are com- 
monly termed, incurable cases, are divided into 61 
cases of mania, 21 of melancholia, and 6 of dementia; 
affording the following tables ; — 

* Mania. 
11 died. 
31 remain in the house. 

5 have been removed by their friends Improved. 
10 have been discharged perfectly recovered. 

4 so much improved as not to require further confinement.' 

' Melancholia. 
6 died. 
6 remain. 

1 removed somewhat improved. 
6 perfectly cured. 

2 so much improved as not to require further confinement.' 

' Dementia. 
2 died. 
2 remain. 
2 discharged as unsuitable objects. 

The following statement shows the ages of patients 
at present in the house : — 

« 15 to 20 inclusive 2 

20 to 30 — 8 

30 to 40 — 12 

40 to 50 — 7 

60 to 70 — ' 11 

70 to 80 — 4 

80 to 90 — 2' 

Of 79 patients it appears that 

' 12 went mad from disappointed affections. 
2 from epilepsy. 
49 from constitutional causes. 
8 from failure in business. 
4 from hereditary disposition to madness. 
2 from injury of the skull. 
1 from mercury. 
1 from parturition.' 

The following case is extremely curious ; and we 
wish it had been authenticated by name, place, and 
signature. 

' A young woman, who was employed as a domestic servant by 
the father of the relater, when he was a boy, became insane, and 
at length sunk into a state of perfect idiocy. In this condition 
she remained for many years, when she was attacked by a ty- 
phus fever ; and my friend, having then practised some time, 
attended her. He was surprised to observe, as the fever ad- 
vanced, a development of the mental powers. During that 
period of the fever, when others were delirious, this patient 
was entirely rational. She recognized in the face of her medical 
attendant the son of her old master, whom she had known so 
many- years before; and she related many circumstances re- 
specting his family, and others which had happened to herself 
in her earlier days. But, alas ! it was only the gleam of rea- 
son. As the fever abated, clouds again enveloped the mind • 
she sunk into her former deplorable state, and remained in it 
until her death, which happened a few years afterwards. I 
leave to the metaphysical reader further speculation on this, 
certainly, very curious case.'— (p. 137.) 

Upon the whole, we have little doubt that this is the 
.best managed asylum for the insane that has ever yet 
been established; and a part of the explanation no 
doubt is, that the Quakers take more pains than other 
people with their madmen. A mad Quaker belongs to 
a small and a rich sect ; and is, therefore, of greater 
importance than any other mad person of the same 



degree in life. After every allowance, however, 
which can be made for the feelings of sectaries, exer- 
cised towards their own disciples, the Quakers, it must 
be allowed, are a very charitable and humane people. 
They are always ready with their money, and, what 
is of far more importance, with their time and atten- 
tion, for every variety of human misfortune. 

They seem to set themselves down systematically 
before the difficulty, with the wise conviction that it 
is to be lessened or subdued only by great labour and 
thought ; and that it is always increased by indolence 
andneglect. In this instance ? they have set an example 
of courage, patience, and kindness, which cannot be 
too highly commended, or too widely diffused ; and 
which, we are convinced, will gradually bring into re- 
pute a milder and better method of treating the insane. 
For the aversion to inspect places of this sort is so 
great, and the temptation to neglect and oppress the 
insane is so strong,, both from the love of power and 
the improbability of detection, that we have no doubt 
of the existence of great abuses in the interior of many 
madhouses. A great deal has been done for prisons ; 
but the order of benevolence has been broken through 
by this preference ; for the voice of misery may soon- 
er come up from a dungeon, than the oppression of a 
madman be healed by the hand of justice.* 



AMERICA. (Edinburgh Review, 1818.) 

1. Travels in Canada and the United States, in 1816 and 1817. 
By Lieutenant Francis Hall, 14th Light Dragoons, H. P. 
London. Longman & Co. 1818. 

2. Journal of Travels in the United States of North America, 
and in Lower Canada, performed in the year 1817, ifc. Sfc. 
By John Palmer. London. Sherwood, Neely & Jones. 
1818. 

3. A Narrative of a Journey of Five Thousand Miles through 
the Eastern and Western States of America ; contained in 
Eight Reports, addressed to the Thirty-nine English Fami 
lies by whom the Author was deputed, in June, 1817, to ascer- 
tain whether any and what Part of the United States would be 
suitable for their Residence. With Remarks on Mr. Birk- 
beck's ' Notes' and ' Letters? By Henry Bradshaw Fearon. 
London. Longman & Co. 1818. 

4. Travels in the Interior of America, in the Years 1809, 1810, 
and 1811, &fc. By John Bradbury, F. L. S. Lond. 8vo. 
London. Sherwood, Neely & Jones. 1817. 

These four books are all very well worth reading, to 
any person who feels, as we do, the importance and 
interest of the subject of which they treat. They 
contain a great deal of information and amusement ; 
and will probably decide the fate, and direct the foot- 
steps, of many human beings, seeking a better lot than 
the Old World can afford them. Mr. Hall is a clever, 
lively man, very much above the common race of wri- 
ters ; with very liberal and reasonable opinions, which 
he expresses with great boldness, — and an inexhausti- 
ble fund of good humour. He has the elements of wit 
in him ; but sometimes is trite and flat when he means * 
to be amusing. He writes verses, too, and is occa- 
sionally long and metaphysical : but upon the whole, 
we think highly of Mr. Hall ; and deem him, if he is 
not more than twenty-five years of age, an extraordi- 
nary young man. He is not the less extraordinary for 
being a lieutenant of Light Dragoons — as it is certainly 
somewhat rare to meet with an original thinker,, an 
indulgent judge of manners, and a man tolerant of 
neglect and familiarity, in a youth covered with tags, 
feathers, and martial foolery. 

Mr. Palmer is a plain man, of good sense and slow 
judgment. Mr. Bradbury is a botanist, who lived a 
good deal among the savages, but worth attending to. 
Mr. Fearon is a much abler writer than either of the 
two last, but no lover of Ameriea, — and a little givea 
to exaggeration in his views of vices and prejudices. 

*The Society of Friends have been entremely fortunate in 
the choice of their male and female superintendents at the asy«» 
lum, Mr. and Mrs. Jephson. It is not easy to find a greater 
combination of good sense and good feeling than these two- 
persons possess :— but then the merit of selecting them rests 
with their employers* 



74 



WORKS OF THE REV. SIDNEY SMITH. 



Among other faults with which our government is 
chargeable, the vice of impertinence has lately crept 
into our cabinet ; and the Americans have been treated 
with ridicule and contempt. But they are becoming a 
little too powerful, we take it, for this cavalier sort of 
management ; and are increasing with a rapidity 
which is really no matter of jocularity to us, or the 
other powers of the Old World. In 1791, Baltimore 
contained 13,000 inhabitants; in 1810, 46,000; in 1817, 
60,000. In 1790, it possessed 13,000 tons of shipping ; 
in 1 798, 59,000 ; in 1805, 72,000 ; in 1810, 103,444. The 
progress of Philadelphia is as follows : 

Houses. Inhabitants. 

♦ In 1683 there were in the city 80 and 600 

1700 ... 700 5,000 

1749 - - - 2,076 15,000 

1760 - - - 2,969 20,000 

1769 - - - 4,474 30,000 

1776 - - - 5,460 40,000 

1783 - - - 6,000 42,000 

1806 - - - 13,000 90,000 

1810 - - - 22,769 100,000 



'Now it is computed there are at least 120,000 inhabitants 
in the city and suburbs, of which 10,000 are free coloured peo- 
ple.'— Palmer, p. 254, 255. 

The population of New York (the city), in 1805, was 
60,000 ; it is now 120,000. Their shipping, at present, 
amounts to 300,000 tons. The population of the state 
of New York was, at the accession of his present ma- 
jesty, 97,000, and is now nearly 1 ,000,000. Kentucky, 
first settled in 1773, had, in 1792, a population of 100,- 
000 ; and in 1810, 406,000. Morse reckons the Avhole 
population of the western territory, in 1790, at 6,000 ; 
in 1810 it was near half a million ; and will probably 
exceed a million in 1820. These, and a thousand other 
equally strong proofs of their increasing strength, tend 
to extinguish pleasantry and provoke thought. 

We were surprised and pleased to find from these 
accounts that the Americans on the Red River and the 
Arkansas River have begun to make sugar and wine. 
Their importation of wool into this country is becom- 
ing also an object of some consequence ; and they 
have inexhaustible supplies of salt and coal. But one 
of the great sources of wealth in America is and will 
be an astonishing command of inland navigation. The 
Mississippi, flowing from the north to the Gulf of Mex- 
ico, through seventeen degrees of latitude ; the Ohio 
and the Alleghany almost connecting it with the Nor- 
thern Lakes ; the Wabash, the Illinois, the Missouri, 
the Arkansas, the Red River, flowing from the con- 
fines of New Mexico ; — these rivers, all navigable, and 
most of them already frequented by steam-boats, con- 
stitute a facility of internal communication not, we 
believe, to be paralleled in the whole world. 

One of the great advantages of the American gov- 
ernment is its cheapness. The American king has 
about £5000 per annum, the vice-king £1000. They 
hire their Lord Liverpool at about a thousand per 
annum, and their Lord Sidmouth (a good bargain) at 
the same sum. Their Mr. Crokers are inexpressibly 
reasonable, — somewhere about the price of an Eng- 
lish door-keeper, or bearer of mace. Life, however, 
seems to go on very well, in spite of these low sala- 
ries ; and the purposes of government to be very fairly 
answered. Whatever may be the evils of universal 
suffrage in other countries, they have not yet been 
felt in America ; and one thing at least is established 
by her experience, that this institution is not necessa- 
rily followed by those tumults, the dread of which ex- 
cites so much apprehension in this country. In the 
most democratic states, where the payment of direct 
taxes is the only qualification of a voter, the elections 
are carried on with the utmost tranquillity ; and the 
whole business, by taking votes in each parish or sec- 
tion, concluded all over the state in a single day. A 
great deal is said by Fearon about Caucus, the cant 
word of the Americans for the committees and party 
meetings in which the business of elections is prepa- 
red — the influence of which he seems to consider as 
prejudicial. To us, however, it appears to be nothing 
more than the natural, fair, and unavoidable influence 
which talent, popularity, and activity always must 



have upon such occasions. What other influence can 
the leading characters of the democratic party in 
Congress possibly possess ? Bribery is entirely out ot 
the question— equally so is the influence of family and 
fortune. What then can they do, with their caucus, 
or without it, but recommend ? And what charge is 
it against the American government to say that those 
members of whom the people have the highest opinion 
meet together to consult whom they shall recommend 
for president, and that their recommendation is sue 
cessful in their different states? Could any friend to 
good order wish other means to be employed, or other 
results to follow ? No statesman can wish to exclude 
influence, but only bad influence ; — not the influence 
of sense and character, but the influence of money and 
punch. 

A very disgusting feature in the character of tht 
present English government is its extreme timidity 
and the cruelty and violence to which its timidity 
gives birth. Some hotheaded young person, in de- 
fending the principles of liberty, and attacking those 
abuses to which all governments are liable, passes the 
bounds of reason and moderation, or is thought to 
have passed them by those whose interest it is to think 
so. What matters it whether he has or not? You 
are strong enough to let him alone. With such insti 
tutions as ours he can do no mischief; perhaps he 
may owe his celebrity to your opposition ; or, if he 
must be opposed, write against him, — set Candidus, 
Scrutator, Vindex, or any of the conductitious pen- 
men of government to write him down ; — any thing 
but the savage spectacle of a poor wretch, perhaps a 
very honest man, contending in vain against the 
weight of an immense government, pursued by a zea- 
lous attorney, and sentenced, by some candidate, per- 
haps, for the favour of the crown, to the long miseries 
of the dungeon.* ^* 

A still more flagrant instance may be found in our 
late suspensions of the habeas corpus act. Nothing was 
trusted to the voluntary activity of a brave people, 
thoroughly attached to their government — nothing to 
the good sense and prudence of the gentlemen and 
yeomen of the country — nothing to a little forbear 
ance, patience, and watchfulness. There was no other 
security but despotism ; nothing but the alienation of 
that right which no king nor minister can love, and 
which no human beings but the English have had the 
valour to win, and the prudence to keep. The contrast 
between our government and that of the Americans, 
upon the subject of suspending the habeas corpus, is 
drawn in so very able a manner by Mr. Hall, that we 
must give the passage at large. 

' It has ever been the policy of the federalists to " strengthen 
the hands of government." No measure can be imagined 
more effectual for this purpose, than a law which gifts the ru- 
ling po vers with infallibility ; but no sooner was it enacted, 
than it revealed its hostility to the principles of the American 
system, by generating oppression under the cloak of defending 
social order. 

' If there ever was a period when circumstances seemed to 
justify what are called energetic measures, it was during the 
administrations of Mr. Jefferson and his successor. A disas- 

* A great deal is said about the independence and integrity 
of English judges. In causes between individuals they are 
strictly independent and upright : but they have strong temp- 
tations to be otherwise, in cases where the crown prosecutes 
for libel. Such cases often involve questions of party, and 
are viewed with great passion and agitation by the minister 
and his friends. Judges have often favours to ask for their 
friends and families, and dignities to aspire to for themselves. 
It is human nature, that such powerful motives should create 
a great bias against the prisoner. Suppose the chief justice 
of any court to be in an infirm state of health, and a govern- 
ment libel-cause to be tried by one of the puisne judges,— of 
what immense importance is it to that man to be called a 
strong friend to government— how injurious to his natural and 
fair hopes to be called lukewarm, or addicted to popular no- 
tions—and how easily the runners of the government would 
attach such a character to him ! The useful inference from 
these observations is, that, in all government cases, the jury, 
instead of being influenced by the cant phrases about the in- 
tegrity of English judges, should suspect the operation of such 
motives — watch the judge with the most accurate jealousy— 
and compel him to be honest, by throwing themselves into th« 
opposite scale whenever he is inclined to be otherwise. 



AMERICA. 



75 



irous war began to rage, not only on the frontiers, but in the 
very penetralia of the republic. To oppose veteran troops, 
the ablest generals, and the largest fleets in the world, the 
American government had raw recruits, officers who had 
never seen an enemy, half a dozen frigates, and a population 
Unaccustomed to sacrifices, and impatient of taxation. To 
crown these disadvantages, a most important section of the 
Union, the New England states, openly set up the standard of 
separation and rebellion. A convention sat for the express 
purpose of thwarting the measures of government ; while the 
press and pulpit thundered every species of denunciation 
against whoever should assist their own country in the hour 
of danger.* And this was the work, not of jacobins and de- 
mocrats, but of the staunch friends of religion and social order, 
who had been so zealously attached to the government, while 
it was administered by their own party, that they suffered not 
the popular breath " to visit the president's breech too 
roughly." 

• The course pursued, both by Mr. Jefferson and Mr. Madi- 
son throughout this season of difficulty, merits the gratitude of 
their country, and the imitation of all governments pretending 
to be free. 

' So far were they from demanding any extraordinary pow- 
ers from Congress, that they did not even enforce, to their full 
extent, those with which they were by the constitution invest- 
ed. The process of reasoning, on which they probably acted, 
may be thus stated. The majority of the nation is with us, be- 
cause the war is national. The interests of a minority suffer ; 
and self-interest is clamorous when injured. It carries its op- 
position to an extreme inconsistent with its political duty. 
Shall we leave it in an undisturbed career of faction, or seek 
to put it down with libel and sedition laws ? In the first case 
ft will grow bold from impunity ; its proceedings will be more 
and more outrageous : but every step it takes to thwart us will 
be a step in favour of the enemy, and, consequently, so much 
ground lost in public opinion. But, as public opinion is the 
only instrument by which a minority can convert a majority 
to its views, impunity, by revealing its motives, affords the su- 
rest chance of defeating its intent. In the latter case, we quit 
the ground of reason to take that of force ; we give the fac- 
tious the advantage of seeming persecuted ; by repressing in- 
temperate discussion, we confess ourselves liable to be injured 
by it. If we seek to shield our reputation by a libel-law, we 
acknowledge, either that our conduct will not bear investiga- 
tion, or that the people are incapable of distinguishing betwixt 
truth and falehood : but for a popular government to impeach 
the sanctity of the nation's judgment is to overthrow the pil- 
lars of its own elevation. 

• The event triumphantly proved the correctness of this rea- 
soning. The federalists awoke from the delirium of factious 
intoxication, and found themselves covered with contempt and 
thame. Their country had been in danger, and they gloried 
in her distress. She had exposed herself to privations from 
which they had extracted profit. In her triumphs they had no 
part, except that of having mourned over and depreciated 
them. Since the war federalism has been scarcely heard of.' — 
Hall, 508—511. 

The Americans, we believe, are the first persons 
who have discarded the tailor in the administration of 
justice, and his auxiliary the barber — two persons of 
endless importance in codes and pandects of Europe. 
A judge administers justice, without a calorific wig 
and. parti-coloured gown, in a coat and pantaloons. 
He is obeyed, however ; and life and property are not 
badly protected in the United States. We shall be 
denounced by the laureate as atheists and jacobins ; 
but we must say, that we have doubts whether one 
Atom of useful influence is added to men in important 
situations by any colour, quantity, or configuration of 
cloth and hair. The true progress of refinement, we 
conceive, is to discard all the mountebank drapery of 
barbarous ages. One row of gold and fur falls off af- 
ter another from the robe of power, and is picked up 
and worn by the parish beadle and the exhibiter of 
wild beasts. Meantime, the afflicted wiseacre mourns 
over equality of garment ; and wotteth not of two 
men, whose doublets have cost alike, how one shall 
command and the other obey. 

* ' In Boston, associations were entered into for the purpose 
of preventing the filling up of government loans. Indi- 
viduals disposed to subscribe were obliged to do it in secret, 
and conceal their names, as if the action had been dishonest.' — 
Vide ' Olive Branch,' p. 307. At the same time, immense runs 
were made by the Boston banks on those of the Central and 
Southern states ; while the specie thus drained was transmit- 
ted to Canada, in payment for smuggled goods and British go- 
vernment bills, which were drawn in Quebec, and disposed of 
in great numbers, on advantageous terms, to monied men in 
the states. Mr. Henry's mission is the best proof of the result 
anticipated by our government from these proceedings in New 
England. 



^Jhe dress of lawyers, is, however, at all events, of 
less importance than their charges. Law is cheap in 
America : in England, it is better, in a mere pecuni- 
ary point of view, to give up forty pounds than to con- 
tend for it in a court of common law. It costs that 
sum in England to win a cause ; and, in the court of 
equity, it is better to abandon five hundred or a thou- 
sand pounds than to contend for it. We mean to say 
nothing disrespectful of the chancellor — who is an 
upright judge, a very great lawyer, and zealous to do 
all he can ; but we believe the Court of Chancery to 
be in a state which imperiously requires legislative 
correction. We do not accuse it of any malversation, 
but of a complication, formality, entanglement, and 
delay, which the life, the wealth, and the patience of 
man cannot endure. How such a subject comes not 
to have been taken up in the House of Commons, we 
are wholly at a loss to conceive. We feel for climb- 
ing boys as much as anybody can do ; but what is a 
climbing boy in a chimney to a full-grown suitor in a 
Master's office ? And whence comes it, in the midst 
of ten thousand compassions and charities, that no 
Wilberforce, or Sister Fry, has started up for the sui- 
tors in Chancery?* and why, in the name of these af- 
flicted and attorney- worn people, are there united in 
their judge three or four offices, any one of which is 
sufficient to occupy the whole time of a very able 
and active man ? 

There are no very prominent men at present in 
America ; at least none whose fame is strong enough 
for exportation. Monroe is a man of plain, unaffected 
good sense. Jefferson, we believe, is still alive ; and 
has always been more remarkable, perhaps, for the 
early share he took in the formation of the republic, 
than from any very predominant superiority of under- 
standing. Mr. Hall made him a visit : 

' I slept at midnight at Monticello, and left it in the monl 
ing with such a feeling as the traveller quits the mouldering 
remains of a Grecian temple, or the pilgrim a fountain in 
the desert. It would indeed argue great torpor both of un- 
derstanding and heart, to have looked without veneration 
and interest on the man who drew up the declaration of 
American independence ; who shared in the councils by 
which her freedom was established; whom the unbought 
voice of his fellow-citizens called to the exercise of a dig- 
nity from which his own moderation impelled him, when 
such example was most salutary, to withdraw ; and who, 
while he dedicates the evening of his glorious days to the 
pursuits of science and literature, shuns none of the hum- 
bler duties of private life ; but, having filled a seat higher 
than that of kings, succeeds with greater dignity to that of 
the good neighbour, and becomes the friendly adviser, law- 
yer, physician, and even gardener of his vicinity. This is 
the " still small voice" of philosophy, deeper and holier 
than the lightnings and earthquakes which have preceded 
it. What monarch would venture thus to exhibit himself 
in the nakedness of his humanity ? On what royal brow 
would the laurel replace the diadem ?' — Hall, 384, 385. 

Mr. Fearon dined with another of the Ex-Kings, 
Mr. Adams. 

: The ex-president is a handsome old gentleman of eighty- 
four ; — his lady is seventy-six ; — she has the reputation of 
superior talents, and great literary acquirements. I was 
not perfectly a stranger here ; as, a few days previous to 
to this, I had received the honour of an hospitable reception 
at their mansion. Upon the present occasion the minister 
(the day being Sunday) was of the dinner party. As the 
table of a " late King" may amuse some of you, take the 
following particulars: — first course, a pudding made of 
Indian corn, molasses, and butter ; — second, veal, bacon, 
neck of mutton, potatoes, cabbages, carrots, and Indian 
beans ; Madeira wine, of which each drank two glasses. 
We sat down to dinner at one o'clock ; at two, nearly all 
went a second time to church. For tea, we had pound- 
cake, sweet bread and butter, and bread made of Indian 
corn any rye (similar to our brown home-made.) Tea was 
brought from the kitchen, and handed round by a neat, 



* This is still one of the great uncorrected evils of the coun- 
try. Nothing can be so utterly absurd as to leave the head of 
the Court of Chancery a political officer, and to subject forty 
millions of litigated property to all the delays and interrup- 
tions which are occasioned by his present multiplicity of offices. 
(1839.)— The Chancellor is Speaker of the House of Lords ; he 
might as well be made Archbishop of Canterbury; — it is one 
of the greatest of existing follies. 



76 



WORKS OF THE REV. SIDNEY SMITH. 



white servant girl. The topics of conversation were vari- 
ous. — England, America, religion, politics, literature, sci- 
ence, Dr. Priestley, Miss Edgeworth, Mrs. Siddons, Mr. 
Kean, France, Shakspeare, Moore, Lord Byron, Cobbett, 
American revolution, the traitor General Arnold. 

« The establishment of this political patriarch consists of a 
house two stories high, containing, I believe, eight rooms ; 
of two men and three maid servants ; tbree horses, and a 
plain carriage. How great is the contrast between this 
individual — a man of knowledge and information — without 
pomp, parade, or vicious and expensive establishments, as 
compared with the costly trappings, the depraved charac- 
ters, and the profligate expenditure of house, and 

? What a lesson in this does America teach ! There 

are now in this land, no less than three Cincinnati !' — 
Fearon, 111—113. 

The travellers agree, we think, in complaining of 
the insubordination of American children — and do not 
much like American ladies. In their criticisms upon 
American gasconade, they forget that vulgar people 
of all countries are full of gasconade. The Americans 
love titles. The following extract from the Boston 
Sentinel, of last August (1817,) is quoted by Mr. 
Fearon. 

' " Dinner to Mr. Adams. — Yesterday a public dinner was 
given to the Hon. John Q. Adams, in the Exchange Coffee- 
house, by his fellow-citizens of Boston. The Hon. Wm. 
Gray presided, assisted by the Hon. Harrison Gray Otis, 
George Blake, Esq., and the Hon. Jonathan Mason, vice- 
presidents. Of the guests were, the Hon. Mr. Adams, late 
president of the United States, his Excellency Governor 
Brooks, his Honor Lt. Gov. Phillips, Chief Justice Parker, 
Judge Story, President Kirkland, Gen. Dearborn, Com. 
Hull, Gen. Miller, several of the reverend clergy, and 
many more public officers, and strangers of eminence." ' 

They all, in common with Mr. Birkbeck, seem to be 
struck with the indolence of the American character. 
Mr. Fearon makes the charge ; and gives us below 
the right explanation of its cause. 

' The life of boarders at an American tavern, presents the 
most senseless and comfortless mode of killing time which 
I have ever seen. Every house of this description that I 
have been in, is thronged to excess ; and there is not a man 
who appears to have a single earthly object in view, except 
spitting, and smoking segars. I have not seen a book in 
the nands of any person since I left Philadelphia. Objec- 
tionable as these habits are, they afford decided evidence of 
the prosperity of that country, which can admit so large a 
body of its citizens to waste in indolence three-fourths of 
their lives, and would also appear to hold out encourage- 
ment to Englishmen with English habits, who could retain 
their industry amid a nation of indolence, and have suffi- 
cient firmness to live in America, and yet bid defiance to 
the deadly example of its natives.' — Fearon, p. 252, 253. 

Yet this charge can hardly apply to the northeast- 
ern parts of the Union. 

The following sample of American vulgarity is not 
unentertaining. 

'On arriving at the tavern door the landlord makes his ap- 
pearance. — Landlord. Your servant, gentlemen, this is a fine 
day. Answer. Very fine. — Land. You've got two nice crea- 
tures, they are right elegant matches. Ans. Yes, we bought 
them for matches. Land. They cost a heap of dollars, (a pause, 
and knowing look) ; 200 I calculate. Ans. Yes, they cost a 
good sum.— Land. Possible ! (a pause) ; going westward to 
Ohio, gentlemen? Ans. We are going to Philadelphia. — 
Land. Philadelphia, ah ! that's a dreadful large place, three 
or four times as big as Lexington. Ans. Ten times as large. 
Land. Is it by George! what a mighty heap of houses, (a 
pause); but I reckon you was not reared in Philadelphia. 
Ans. Philadelphia is not our native place. — Land. Perhaps 
away up in Canada. Ans. No; we are from England. Land. 
Is it possible', well, I calculated you were from abroad, 
(pause) ; how long have you been from the old country ? Ans. 
We left England last March. — Land. And in August here you 
are in Kentuclt. Well, I should haxe guessed you had been in 
the State some years; you speak almost as good English as 
we do! 

'This dialogue is not a literal copy, but it embraces most of 
the frequent and improper applications of words used in the 
back country, with a few New England phrases. By the log- 
house farmer and tavern keeper they are used as often, and as 
erroneously as they occur in the above discourse.' — Palmer, 
p. 129, 130. 

This is of course intended as a representation of the 
manners of the low, or at best, the middling class of 
people in America 



The four travellers, of whose works we are gft/ng 
an account, made extensive tours in every part or 
America, as well in the old as in the new settlements ; 
and, generally speaking, we should say their testimo- 
ny is in favour of American manners. We must, ex- 
cept, perhaps, Mr. Fearon — and yet he seems to have 
very little to say against them. Mr. Palmer tells us 
that he found his companions, officers and farmers, 
unobtrusive, civil, and obliging; that what the servants 
do for you, they do with alacrity; that at their tables 
d'hote ladies are treated with great politeness. We 
have real pleasure in making the following extract 
from Mr. Bradbury's tour. 

'In regard to the manners of the people west of the Alle- 
ghanies, it would be absurd to expect that a general character 
could be now formed, or that it will be for many years to come. 
The population is at present compounded of a great number of 
nations, not yet amalgamated, consisting of emigrants from 
every State in the Union, mixed with English, Irish, Scotch. 
Dutch, Swiss, Germans, French, and almost from every country 
in Europe. In some traits they partake in common with thf. 
inhabitants of the Atlantic States, which results from th* 
nature of their government. That species of hauteur which 
one class of society in some countries shows in their inter 
course with the other, is here utterly unknown. By theii 
constitution, the existence of a privileged order, vested by 
birth with hereditary privileges, honours, or emoluments, ia 
forever interdicted. If therefore, we should here expect to 
find that contemptuous feeling in man for man, we should 
naturally examine amongst those clothed with judicial or 
military authority ; but we should search in vain. The justice 
on the bench, or the officer in the field, is respected and obeyed 
whilst discharging the functions of his office, as the representa 
tive or agent of the law, enacted for the good of all; but should 
he be tempted to treat even the least wealthy of his neigh 
bours or fellow citizens with contumely, he would soon find 
that he could not do it with impunity. Travellers from Eu 
rope, in passing through the western country, or indeed any 
part of the United States, ought to be previously acquainted 
with this part of the American character, and more particularly 
if they have been in the habit of treating with contempt, or 
irritating with abuse, those whom accidental circumstances 
may have placed in a situation to administer to their wants 
Let no one here indulge himself in abusing the waiter or ostler 
at an inn; that waiter or ostler is probably a citizen, and does 
not, nor cannot conceive, that a situation in which he dis- 
charges a duty to society, not in itself dishonourable, should 
subject him to insult: but this feeling, so far as I have expe- 
rienced, is entirely defensive. I have travelled near 10,000 
miles in the United States, and never met with the least inci- 
vility or affront. 

' The Americans, in general, are accused by travellers, of 
being inquisitive. If this be a crime, the western people are 
guilty ; but, for my part, I must say that it is a practice that I 
never was disposed to complain of, because 1 always found 
them as ready to answer a question, as to ask one, and there- 
fore I always came off a gainer ».."" this kind of barter; and if 
any traveller does not, it is his own iault. As this leads me to 
notice their general conduct to strangers, I feel myself bound, 
by gratitude and regard to truth, to speak of their hospitality. 
In my travels through the inhabited parts of the United States, 
not less than 2000 miles was through parts where there were 
no taverns, and where a traveller is under the necessity of 
appealing to the hospitality of the inhabitants. In no on» 
instance has my appeal been fruitless ; although in many cases, 
the furnishing of abed has been evidently attended with incon- 
venience, and in a great many instances no remuneration woula 
be received. Other European travellers have experienced thi* 
liberal spirit of hospitality, and some have repaid it by ca- 
lumny.'— Bradbury p. 304—306. 

We think it of so much importance to do just^e to 
other nations, and to lessen that hatred and contempt 
which race feels for race, that we subjoin two short 
passages from Mr. Hall to the same effect. 

•I had bills on Philadelphia, and applied to a respectable 
store-keeper, that is tradesman, of the village, to cash me one; 
the amount, however, was beyond any remittance he had occa- 
sion to make, but he immediately offered me whatever sum I 
might require for my journey, with no better security than my 
word, for its repayment at Philadelphia: he even insisted on 
my taking more than I mentioned as sufficient. I do not 
believe that this trait of liberality would surprise an American; 
for no one in the States, to whom I mentioned it, seemed to 
consider it as more than any stranger of respectable appearance 
might have looked for, in similar circumstances: but it mighC 
well surprise an English traveller, who had been told, as I had T 
that the Americans never failed to cheat and insult every En- 
gl is.ini an who travelled througa their country, especially if 
thev kuew him to be an officer. This latter particular they 
never failed to inform themselves of, for they are by ■• 



AMERICA. 



77 



means bashful in inquiries: but if the discovery operated in 
any way upon their behaviour, it was rather to my advantage; 
nor did 1 meet with a single case of incivility between Canada 
and Charleston, except at the Shenandoah Point, from a 
drunken English deserter. My testimony, in this particular, 
will certainly not invalidate the complaints of many other 
travellers, who, I doubt not, have frequently encountered 
rude treatment, and quite as frequently deserved it; but it will 
at least prove the possibility of traversing the United States 
without insult or interruption, and even of being occasionally 
surprised by liberality and kindness.'— Hall, p. 255, 256. 

'I fell into very pleasant society at Washington. Strangers 
who intend staying some days in a town, usually take lodgings 
at a boarding-house, in preference to a tavern: in this way 
they obtain the best society the place affords; for there are 
always gentlemen, frequently ladies, either visitors or tempo- 
rary residents, who live in this manner, to avoid the trouble of 
housekeeping. At Washington, during the sittings of Con- 
gress, the boarding-houses are divided into messes, according 
to the political principles of the inmates, nor is a stranger ad- 
mitted without some introduction, and the consent of the 
whole company. I chanced to join a democratic mess, and 
name a few of its members with gratitude, for the pleasure 
their society gave me — Commodore Decatur and his lady, the 
Abbe Correa, the great botanist and plenipotentiary of Por- 
tugal, the Secretary of the Navy, the Secretary of the Navy 
Board, known as the author of a humorous publication entitled 
" John Bull and Brother Jonathan," with eight or ten members 
of Congress, principally from the western States, which are 
generally considered as most decidedly hostile to England, 
but whom I did not on this account find less good-humoured 
and courteous. It is from thus living in daily intercourse with 
the leading characters of the country, that one is enabled to 
judge with some degree of certainty of the practices of its 
government; for to know the paper theory is nothing, unless 
it be compared with the instruments employed to carry it into 
effect. A political constitution maybe nothing but a cabalistic 
form, to extort money and power from the people; but then 
the jugglers must be in the dark, and "no admittance behind 
the curtain." This way of living affords too the best insight 
into the best part of society: for if in a free nation the deposi- 
tories of the public confidence be ignorant or vulgar, it is a 
very fruitless search to look for the opposite qualities in those 
they represent ; whereas, if these be well informed in mind 
and manners, it proves at the least an inclination towards 
knowledge and refinement in the general mass of citizens by 
whom they are selected. My own experience obliges me to a 
favourable verdict in this particular. I found the little circle 
into which I had happily fallen full of good sense and good 
humour, and never quitted it without feeling myself a gainer, 
on the score either of useful information or of social enioy- 
ment.'— Hall, p. 329—331. 

In page 252 Mr. Hall pays some very handsome 
compliments to the gallantry, high feeling, and hu- 
manity of the American troops. Such passages reflect 
the highest honour upon Mr. Hall. They are full of 
courage as well as kindness, and will never be forgiven 
at home. 

Literature the Americans have none — no native 
literature, we mean. It is all imported. They had a 
Franklin, indeed ; and may afford to live for half a 
century on his fame. There is, or was, a Mr. Dwight, 
who wrote some poems ; and his baptismal name was 
Timothy. There is also a small account of Virginia 
by Jefferson, and an epic by Joel Barlow ; and some 
pieces of pleasantry by Mr. Irving. But why should 
the Americans write books, when a six weeks' passage 
brings them, in their own tongue, our sense, science, 
and genius, in bales and hogsheads ? Prairies, steam- 
boats, grist-mills, are their natural objects for centu- 
ries to come. Then, when they have got to the Pacific 
Ocean, epic poems, plays, pleasures of memory, and 
all the elegant gratifications of an ancient people who 
have tamed the wild earth, and set down to amuse 
themselves. This is the natural march of human af- 
fairs. 

The Americans, at least in the old States, are a very 
religious people : but there is no sect there which en- 
joys the satisfaction of excluding others from civil 
offices ,• nor does any denomination of Christians take 
for their support a tenth of produce. Their clergy, 
however, are respectable, respected, and possess no 
small share of influence. The places of worship in 
Philadelphia in 1810, were as follows : Presbyterian, 
8; Episcopalian, 4 j Methodists, 5 ; Catholic, 4; Bap- 
tist, 5 ; Quakers, 4 ; Fighting Quakers, 1 ; Lutheran, 
3; Calvinist, 3; Jews, 2; Universalists, 1 ; Swedish 
Lutheran, 1 ; Moravian, 1 ; Congregationalists, 1 ; 
Unitarians,' 1 ; Covenanters, 1 ; Black Baptists, 1 j 



Black Episcopalians, 1 ; Black Methodists, 2. The 
Methodists, Mr. Palmer tells us, are becoming the 
most numerous sect in the United States. 

Mr. Fearon gives us this account of the state of re 
ligion in New York. 

< Upon this interesting topic I would repeat, what indeed 
you are already acquainted with, that legally there is the 
most unlimited liberty. There is no state religion, and no 
government prosecution of individuals for conscience sake. 
Whether those halcyon days, which I think would attend a 
similar state of things in England, are in existence here, 
must be left for future observation. There are five Dutch 
Reformed churches; six Presbyterian ; three Associated Re- 
formed ditto; one Associated Presbyterian; one Reformed 
ditto; five Methodist; two ditto for blacks; one German 
Reformed; one Evangelical Lutheran; one Moravian; 
four Trinitarian Baptist; one Universalist; two Catholic; 
three Quaker; eight Episcopalian; one Jew's Synagogue; 
and to this I would add a small Meeting which is but little 
known, at which the priest is dispensed with, every member 
following what they call the apostolic plan of instructing 
each other, and " building one another up in their most 
holy faith." The Presbyterian and Episcopalian, or Church 
of England sects, take the precedence in numbers and in 
respectability. Their ministers receive from two to eight 
thousand dollars per annum. All the churches are well 
filled; they are the fashionable places for display; and the 
sermons and talents of the minister offer never-ending sub- 
jects of interest when social converse has been exhausted 
upon the bad conduct and inferior nature of niggars (ne- 
groes); the price of flour at Liverpool; the capture of the 
Guerriere; and the battle of New Orleans. The perfect 
equality of all sects seems to have deadened party feeling : 
controversy is but little known.' — Fearon, p. 45, 46. 

The absence of controversy, Mr. Fearon seems to 
imagine, has produced indifference : and he heaves a 
sigh to the memory of departed oppression. * Can it 
be possible (he asks) that the non-existence of reli- 
gious oppression has lessened religious knowledge, 
and made men superstitiously dependent upon out- 
ward form, instead of internal purity ? ' To which 
question (a singular one from an enlightened man like 
Mr. Fearon) , we answer, that the absence of religious 
oppression has not lessened religious knowledge, but 
theological animosity ; and made men more dependent 
upon the pious actions, and less upon useless and un- 
intelligible wrangling.* 

The great curse of America is the institution of 
slavery — of itself far more than the foulest blot upon 
their national character, and an evil which counter 
balances all the excisemen, licensers, and tax-gather- 
ers of England. No virtuous man ought to trust his 
own character, or the character of his children, to the 
demoralizing effects produced by commanding slaves. 
Justice, gentleness, pity, and humility, soon give way 
before them. Conscience suspends its functions. The 
love of command — the impatience of restraint, get the 
better of every other feeling ; and cruelty has no other 
limit than fear. 

* "There must doubtless," says Mr. Jefferson, "be an 
unhappy influence on the manners of the people produced 
by the existence of slavery among us. The whole com- 
merce between master and slave is a perpetual exercise of 
the most boisterous passions : the most unremitting despo- 
tism on the one part, and degrading submissions on the 
other. Our children see this, and learn to imitate it; for 
man is an imitative animal. The parent storms, the child 
looks on, catches the lineaments of wrath, puts on the same 
airs in the circle of smaller slaves, gives loose to the worst 
of passions; and thus nursed, educated, and daily exercised 
in tyranny, cannot but be stamped by it with odious pecu- 
liarities. The man must be a prodigy who can retain Ms 
morals and manners undepraved by such circumstances. ,, ' 
Notes, p. 251.— HaU, p. 459. 

The following picture of a slave song is quoted by 
Mr. Hall from the " Letters on Virginia." 

1 "I took the boat this morning, and crossed the ferry 
over to Portsmouth, the small town which I told you is 
opposite to this place. It was court day, and a large crowd 
of people was gathered about the door of the court-house. 



* Mr. Fearon mentions a religious lottery for building a 
Presbyterian church. What will Mr. Littleon say to this? 
he is hardly prepared, we suspect, for this union of Calvin 
and the Little Go. Every advantage will be made of it by 
the wit and eloquence of his fiscal opponent, nor vi* t 
paas unheeded by Mr. Bish. 



78 



^ WORKS OF THE REV. SIDNEY SMITH. 



I had hardly got upon the steps to look in, when my ears 
were assailed by the voice of singing ; and turning round 
to discover from what quarter it came, I saw a group of 
about thirty negroes, of different sizes and ages, following 
a rough-looking white man, who sat carelessly lolling in his 
sulky. They had just turned round the corner, and were 
coming up the main street to pass by the spot where I stood, 
on their way out of town. As they came nearer, I saw some 
of then loaded with chains to prevent their escape; while 
others had hold of each other's hands, strongly grasped, as 
if to support themselves in their affliction. I particularly- 
noticed a poor mother, with an infant sucking at her breast 
as she walked along, while two small children had hold of 
her apron on either side, almost running to keep up with 
the rest. They came along singing a little wild hymn, of 
sweet and mournful melody, flying, by a divine instinct of 
the heart, to the consolation of religion, the last refuge of 
the unhappy, to support them in their distress. The sulky 
now stopped before the tavern, at a little distance beyond 
the court-house, and the driver got out. "My dear sir," 
said I to a person who stood near me, "can you tell me 
what these poor people have been doing ? What is their 
crime? and what is to be their punishment?" "0," said 
he, "it's nothing at all, but a parcel of negroes sold to 
Carolina; and that man is their driver, who has bought 
them." "But what have they done, that they should be 
sold into banishment?" "Done," said he "nothing at all, 
that I know of ; their masters wanted money, I suppose, 
and these drivers give good prices." Here the driver hav- 
ing supplied himself with brandy, and his horse with water 
(the poor negroes of course wanted nothing,) stepped into 
his chair again, cracked his whip, and drove on, while the 
miserable exiles followed in funeral procession behind 
him."— Hall, 358—360. 

The law by which siaves are governed in the Caroli- 
nas, is a provincial law as old as 1740, but made per- 
petual in 1783. By this law it is enacted, that every 
negro shall be presumed a slave unless the contrary- 
appear. The 9th clause allows two justices of the 
peace, and three freeholders, power to put them to 
any manner of death ; the evidence against them may 
be without oath. — No slave is to traffic on his own ac- 
count. — Any person murdering a slave is to«pay 100Z. 
— orl4Z. if he cuts out the tongue of a slave. — Any 
white man meeting seven slaves together on an high 
road, may give them twenty lashes each. — No man 
must teach a slave to write, under penalty of 1001. 
currency. We have Mr. Hall's authority for the ex- 
istence and enforcement of this law at the present 
day. Mr. Fearon has recorded some facts still more 
instructive. 

« Observing a great many coloured people, particularly 
females, in these boats, I concluded that they were emi- 
grants, who had proceeded thus far on their route towards 
a settlement. The fact proved to be, that fourteen of the 
flats were freighted with human beings for sale. They had 
been collected in the several states by slave dealers, and 
shipped from Kentucky for a market. They were dressed 
up to the best advantage, on the same principle that jockeys 
do horses upon sale. The following is a specimen of adver- 
tisements on this subject. 

"twenty dollars reward 

"Will be paid for apprehending and lodging in jail, or de- 
livering to the subscriber, the following slaves, belonging 
to Joseph Irvin, of Iberville. — TOM, a very light mulatto, 
blue eyes, 5 feet 10 inches high, appears to be about 35 
years of age; an artful fellow— can read and write, and 
preaches occasionally.— CHARLOTTE, a black wench, 
round and full faced, tall, straight, and likely — about 25 
years of age, and wife of the above named Tom. These 
slaves decamped from their owner's plantation on the night 
of the 14th September instant." — Fearon, p. 270. 

'The three "African churches," as they are called, are 
for all those native Americans who are black, or have any 
shade of colour darker than white. These persons, though 
many of them are possessed of the rights of citizenship, are 
not admitted into the churches which are visited by whites. 
There exists a penal law, deeply written in the mind of the 
whole white population, which subjects their coloured fel- 
low-citizens to unconditional contumely and never-ceasing 
insult. No respectability, however unquestionable, — no 
property, however large,— no character, however unblem- 
ished, will gain a man, whose body is (in American esti- 
mation) cursed with even a twentieth portion of the blood 
of his African ancestry, admission into society ! ! ! They 
are considered as mere Pariahs — as outcasts and vagrants 
upon the face of the earth! I make no reflection upon 
these things, but leave the facts for your consideration." ' — 
Hid. p. 168, 169. 



That such feelings and such practices should exist 
among men who know the value of liberty, and profess 
to understand its principles, is the consummation of 
wickedness. Every American who loves his country, 
should dedicate his whole life, and every faculty of 
his soul, to efface this foul stain from its character. 
If nations rank according to their wisdom and their 
virtue, what right has the American, a scourger and 
murderer of slaves, to compare himself with the 
least and lowest of the European nations? — much 
more with this great and humane country, where the 
greatest lord dare not lay a finger upon the meanest 
peasant? What is freedom, where all are not free? 
where the greatest of God's blessings is limited. Avith 
impious caprice, to the colour of the body ? And these 
are the men who taunt the English with their corrupt 
Parliament, with their buying and selling votes. Let 
the world judge which is the most liable to censure — 
we who, in the midst of our rottenness, have torn off 
the manacles of slaves all over the world; — or they 
who, with their idle purity, and useless perfection, 
have remained mute and careless, while groans echo- 
ed and whips clanked round the very walls of their 
spotless Congress. We wish well to America — we re- 
joice in her prosperity — and are delighted to resist the 
absurd impertinence with which the character of her 
people is often treated in this country : but the exist- 
ence of slavery in America is an atrocious crime, with 
which no measures can be kept — for which her situa- 
tion affords no sort of apology — which makes liberty 
itself distrusted, and the boast of it disgusting. 

As for emigration, every man, of course, must de- 
termine for himself. A carpenter under thirty years 
of age, who finds himself at Cincinnati with "an axe 
over his shoulder, and ten pounds in his pocket, will 
get rich in America, if the change of climate does not 
kill him. So will a farmer who emigrates early with 
some capital. But any person with tolerable prosper- 
ity here had better remain where he is. There are 
considerable evils, no doubt, in England : but it would 
be madness not to admit, that it is, upon the whole, a 
very happy country — and we are much mistaken if 
the next twenty years will not bring with it a great 
deal of internal improvement. The country has long 
been groaning under the evils of the greatest foreign 
war we were ever engaged in ; and we are just begin- 
ning to look again into our home affairs. Political 
economy has made an astonishing progress since tbey 
were last investigated ; and every session of Parlia- 
ment brushes off some of the cobwebs and dust of our 
ancestors.* The Apprentice Laws have been s-vept 
away: the absurd nonsense of the Usury Laws will 
probably soon follow, Public Education and Saving 
Banks have been the invention of these last ten years : 
and the strong fortress of bigotry has been rudely as- 
sailed. Then, with all its defects, we have a Parlia- 
ment of inestimable value. If there be a place in any 
country where 500 well educated men can meet to- 
gether and talk with impunity of public affairs, and if 
what they say is published, that country must im- 
prove. It is not pleasant to emigrate into a country 
of changes and revolution, the size and integrity ol 
whose empire no man can predict. The Americans 
are a very sensible, reflecting people, and have con 
ducted their affairs extremely well ; but it is scarce!} 

}>ossible to conceive that such an empire should very 
ong remain undivided, or that the dwellers on the 
Columbia should have common interest with the navi- 
gators of the Hudson and the Delaware. 

England is, to be sure, a very expensive country ; 
but a million of millions has been expended in mak- 
ing it habitable and comfortable ; and this is a con- 
stant source of revenue, or what is the same thing, a 
constant diminution of expense to every man living 
in it. The price an Englishman pays for a turnpike 
road is not equal to the tenth part of what the delay 



* In a scarcity which occurred little more than twenty 
years ago, every judge, (except the Lord Chancellor, then 
Justice of the Common Pleas, and Serjeant Remington,) 
when they charged the grand jury, attributed the scarcity to 
the combinations of the farmers; and complained of it as a 
very serious evil. Such doctrines would not now be tole- 
rated in the mouth of a schoolboy. 



GAME LAWS. 



79 



^ould cost him without a turnpike. The New River 
Company brings water to every inhabitant of London 
at an infinitely less price than he could dip for it out of 
the Thames. No country, in fact, is so expensive as 
one which human beings are just beginning to inhabit ; 
— where there are no roads, no bridges, no skill, no 
combination of powers, and no force of capital. 

How, too, can any man take upon himself to say, 
that he is so indifferent to his country that he will not 
begin to love it intensely, when he is 5000 or 6000 
miles from it? And what a dreadful disease Nostal- 
gia must be on the banks of the Missouri ! Severe 
and painful poverty will drive us all anywhere : but a 
wise man should be quite sure he has so irresistible a 
plea, before he ventures on the Great or the Little 
Wabash. He should be quite sure that he does not 
go there from ill temper— or to be pitied— or to be re- 
gretted—or from ignorance of what is to happen to 
him — or because he is a poet — but because he has not 
enough to eat here, and is sure of abundance where he 
is going. 



GAME LAWS. (Edinburgh Review, 1819.) 

Three Letters on the Game Laws. Rest Fenner, Black & Co. 
London, 1818. 

The evil of the Game Laws, in their present state, has 
long been felt, and of late years has certainly rather 
increased than diminished. We believe that they can- 
not long remain in their present state ; and we are anx- 
ious to express our opinion of those changes which 
they ought to experience. 

We thoroughly acquiesce in the importance of en- 
couraging those field sports which are so congenial to 
the habits of Englishmen, and which, in the present 
state of society, afford the only effectual counterbal- 
ance to the allurements of great towns. We cannot 
conceive a more pernicious condition for a great na- 
tion, than that its aristocracy should be shut up from 
one year's end to another in a metropolis, while the 
mass of its rural inhabitants are left to its factors and 
agents. A great man returning from London to spend 
his summer in the country, diffuses intelligence, im- 
proves manners, communicates pleasure, restrains 
the extreme violence of subordinate politicians, and 
makes the middling and lower classes better acquaint- 
ed with, and more attached to their natural leaders. 
At the same time a residence in the country gives to 
the makers of laws an opportunity of studying those 
interests which they may afterwards be called upon to 
protect and arrange. Nor is it unimportant to the 
character of the higher orders themselves, that they 
should pass a considerable part of the year in the 
midst of these their larger families ; that they should 
occasionally be thrown among simple, laborious, frugal 
people, and be stimulated to resist the prodigality of 
courts, by viewing with their own eyes the merits and 
the wretchedness of the poor. 

Laws for the preservation of game are not only of 
importance, as they increase the amusements of the 
country, but they may be so constructed as to be per- 
fectly just. The game which my land feeds is certain- 
ly mine ; or, in other words, the game which all the 
land feeds certainly belongs to all the owners of the 
land ; and the only practical way of dividing it is, to 
give to each proprieter what he can take on his own 
ground. Those who contribute nothing to the support 
of the animal, can have no possible right to a share in 
the distribution. To say of animals, that they are 
fera Naiurd, means only, that the precise place of 
their birth and nurture is not known. How they shall 
be divided, is a matter of arrangement among those 
whose collected property certainly has produced and 
fed them ; but the case is completely made out against 
those who have no land at all, and who cannot there- 
fore have been in the slightest degree instrumental to 
their production. If a large pond were divided by cer- 
tain marks into four parts, and allotted to that number 
of proprietors, the fish contained in that pond would 
be in the same sense, fera: Naturd. Nobody could tell 
in which particular division each carp had been born 
and bred. The owners would arrange their respective 



rights and pretensions in the best way they could 
but the clearest of all propositions would be, that the 
four proprietors, among them made a complete title of 
all the fish ; and that nobody but them had the small- 
est title to the smallest share. This we say, in answer 
to those who contend that there is no foundation for 
any system of game laws ; that animals born wild are 
the property of the public ; and that their appropria- 
tion is nothing but tyranny and usurpation. 

In addition to these arguments, it is perhaps scarce- 
ly necessary to add, that nothing which is worth hav- 
ing, which is accessible, and supplied only in limited 
quantities, could exist at all, if it was not considered 
as the property of some individual. If every body 
might take game wherever they found it, there would 
soon be an end to every species of game. The advan- 
tage would not be extended to fresh classes, but be an- 
nihilated for all classes. Besides all this, the privil- 
ege of killing game could not be granted without the 
privilege of trespassing on landed property; — an in- 
tolerable evil, which would entirely destroy the com- 
fort and privacy of a country fife. 

But though a system of game laws is of great use in 
promoting country amusements, and may, in itself, be 
placed on a footing of justice, its effects, we are sorry 
to say, are by no means favourable to the morals of 
the poor. 

It is impossible to make an uneducated man under- 
stand in what manner a bird hatched nobody knows 
where, — to-day living in my field, to morrow in yours, 
— should be as strictly property as the goose whose 
whole history can be traced in the most authentic 
and satisfactory manner, from the egg to the spit. 
The arguments upon which this depends ^are so con- 
trary to the notions of the poor — so repugnant to their 
passions, — and, perhaps, so much above their com- 
prehension, that they are totally unavailing. The 
same man who would respect an orchard, a garden, 
or an hen-roost, scarcely thinks he is committing any 
fault at all in invading the game-covers of his richer 
neighbour ; and as soon as he becomes wearied of 
honest industry, his first resource is in plundering the 
rich magazine of hares, pheasants, and partridges— 
the top and bottofn dishes, which on every side of his 
village are running and flying before his eyes. As 
these things cannot be done with safety in the day, 
they must be done in the night ; — and in this manner 
a lawless marauder is often formed, who proceeds 
from one infringement of law and property to another, 
till he becomes a thoroughly bad and corrupted mem- 
ber of society. 

These few preliminary observations lead naturally 
to the two principal considerations which are to be 
kept in view, in reforming the game laws ; — to pre- 
serve, as far as is consistent with justice, the amuse- 
ments of the rich, and to dimmish, as much as possi- 
ble, the temptations of the poor. And these ends, it 
seems to us, will be best answered, 

1. By abolishing qualifications. 2. By giving to 
every man a property in the game upon his land. 
3. By allowing game to be bought by any body, and 
sold by its lawful possessors.* 

Nothing can be more grossly absurd than the pre- 
sent state of the game laws, as far as they concern 
the qualification for shooting. In England, no man 
can possibly have a legal right to kill game, who has 
not 100L a- year in land rent. With us, in Scotland, 
the rule is not quite so inflexible, though in principle 
not very different. — But we shall speak to the case 
which concerns by far the greatest number ; and cer- 
tainly it is scarcely possible to imagine a more absurd 
and capricious limitation. For what possible reason 
is a man, who has only 901. per annum in land, not to 
kill the game which his own land nourishes ? If the 
legislature really conceives, as we have heard sur- 
mised by certain learned squires, that a person of such 
a degree of fortune should be confined to profitable 
pursuits, and debarred from that pernicious idleness 
into which he would be betrayed by field sports, it 
would then be expedient to make a qualification for 
bowls or skittles — to prevent landowners from going 

* All this has since been established. 



80 



WORKS OF THE REV. SIDNEY SMITH. 



to races, or following a pack of hounds — and to pro- I 
hibit to men of a certain income, every other species 
of amusement as well as this. The only instance, I 
bowever, in which this paternal care is exercised, is 
that in which the amusement of the smaller land- 
owner is supposed to interfere with those of his richer 
neighbour. He may do what he pleases, and elect 
any other species of ruinous idleness but that in which 
the upper classes of society are his rivals. 

Nay, the law is so excessively ridiculous in the case 
ot small landed proprietors, that on a property of less 
than 1001. per annum, no human being has the right of 
shooting. It is not confined, but annihilated. The 
lord of the manor may be warned off by the proprie- 
tor ; and the proprietor may be informed against by 
any body who sees him sporting. The case is still 
stronger in the instance of large farms. In Northum- 
berland, and on the borders of Scotland, there are large 
capitalists who farm to the amount of two or three 
thousand per aimum, who have the permission of their 
distant non-resident landlords to do what they please 
with the game , and yet who dare not fire oil a gun 
upon their own land. Can any thing be more utterly 
absurd and preposterous, than that the landlord and 
the wealthy tenant together cannot make up a title to 
the hare which is fattened upon the choicest produce 
of their land ? That the landlord, who can let to farm 
the fertility of the land for growing wheat, cannot let 
to farm its power of growing partridges ? That he 
may reap by deputy, but cannot on that manor shoot 
by deputy ? Is it possible that any respectable ma- 
gistrate could fine a farmer for killing a hare upon his 
own grounds with his landlord's consent, without feel- 
ing that he was violating every feeling of common 
sense and justice ? 

Since the enactment of the game laws, there has 
sprung up an entirely new species of property, which 
of course is completely overlooked by their provis- 
ions. An Englishman may possess a million of money 
in funds, or merchandize — may be the Baring or the 
Hope of Europe— provide to government the sudden 
means of equipping fleets and armies, and yet be with- 
out the power of smiting a single partridge, though in- 
vited by the owner of the game td participate in his 
amusement. It is idle to say that the difficulty may 
be got over, by purchasing land : the question is, upon 
what principle of justice can the existence of the diffi- 
culty be defended ? If the right of keeping men- 
servants was confined to persons who had more than 
100?. a-year in the funds, the difficulty might be got 
over by every man who would change his landed prop- 
erty to that extent. But what could justify so capri- 
cious a partiality to one species of property? There 
might be some apology for such laws at the time they 
were made ; but there can be none for their not being 
now accommodated to the changes which time has 
introduced. If you choose to exclude poverty from 
this species of amusement, and to open it to wealth, 
why is it not opened to every species of wealth? 
What amusement can there be morally lawful to an 
holder of turnip land, and criminal in a possessor of 
exchequer bills ? What delights ought to be tolerated 
to long annuities, from which wheat and beans should 
be excluded? What matters whether it is scrip or 
short-horned cattle ? If the locus quo is conceded— if 
the trespass is waived — and if the qualification for any 
amusement is wealth, let it be any provable wealth- 
Dives agris, dives positis infcenore nummis. 

It will be very easy for any country gentleman who 
wishes to monopolize to himself the pleasure of shoot • 
ing, to let to his tenant every other right attached to 
the land, except the right of killing game ; and it will 
be equally easy, in the formation of a new game act, 
to give to the landlord a summary process against his 
tenant, if such tenant fraudulently exercises the privi- 
leges he has agreed to surrender. 

The case which seems most to alarm country gen- 
tlemen, is that of a person possessing a few acres in 
the very heart of a manor, who might, by planting 
food of which they are fond, allure the game into his 
own little domain, and thus reap an harvest prepared 



at the expense of the neighbour who surrounded him. 
But, under the present game laws, if the smaller pos- 
session belongs to a qualified person, the danger of 
intrusion is equally great as it would be under the pro- 
posed alteration ; and the danger from the poacher 
would be the same in both cases. But if it is of such 
great consequence to keep clear from all interference, 
may not such a piece of land be rented or bought ? — 
Or, may not the food which tempts game, be sown in 
the same abundance in the surrounding as in the in- 
closed land ? After all, it is only common justice, that 
he whose property is surrounded on every side by a 
preserver of game, whose corn and turnips are demol- 
ished by animals preserved for the amusement of his 
neighbour, should himself be entitled to that share of 
game which plunders upon his land. The complaint 
which the landed grandee makes is this. ' Here is a 
man who has only a twenty-fourth part of the land, 
and he expects a twenty-fourth part of the game. He 
is so captious and litigious, that he will not be content- 
ed to supply his share of the food without requiring 
his share of what the food produces. I want a neigh- 
bour who has talents only for suffering, not one who 
evinces such a fatal disposition for enjoying.' Upon 
such principles as these, many of the game laws have 
been constructed, and are preserved. The interference 
of a very small property with a very large one ; the 
critical position of one or two fields, is a very serious 
source of vexation on many other occasions besides 
those of game. He who possesses a field in the mid- 
dle of my premises, may build so as to obstruct my 
view ; and may present to me the hinder part of a 
barn, instead of one of the finest landscapes in nature. 
Nay, he may turn his field into tea-gardens, and de- 
stroy my privacy by the introduction of every species 
of vulgar company. The legislature, in all these in- 
stances, has provided no remedy for the inconvenien- 
ces which a small property, by such intermixture, 
may inflict upon a large one, but has secured the same 
rights to unequal proportions. It is very difficult to 
conceive why these equitable principles are to be vio- 
lated in the case of game alone. 

Our securities against that rabble of sportsmen 
which the abolition of qualifications might be sup- 
posed to produce, are; the consent of the owner of the 
soil as an indispensable preliminary, guarded by heavy 
penalties — and the price of a certificate, rendered, 
perhaps, greater than it is at present. It is impossi- 
ble to conceive why the owner of the soil, if the right 
of game is secured to him, has not a right to sell, or 
grant the right of killing it to whom he pleases— just 
as much as he has the power of appointing whom he 
pleases to kill his ducks, pigeons, and chickens. The 
danger of making the poor idle, is a mere pretence. It 
is monopoly calling in the aid of hypocrisy, and tyran- 
ny veiling itself in the garb of philosophical humani- 
ty. A poor man goes to wakes, fairs, and horse-races, 
without pain and penalty ; a little shopkeeper, when 
his work is over, may go to a bull-bait, or to the cock- 
pit ; but the idea of his pursuing an hare, even with- 
the consent of the land-owner, fills the Bucolic senator 
with the most lively appreheLsions of relaxed indus- 
try and ruinous dissipation. The truth is, if a poor 
man does not offend against morals or religion, and 
supports himself and his family without assistance 
the law has nothing to do with his amusements. The 
real barriers against increase of sportsmen (if the pro 
posed alteration were admitted), are, as we have be- 
fore said, the prohibition of the landowner ; the tax t» 
the state for a certificate ; the necessity of labouring 
for support.— Whoever violates none of these rights, 
and neglects none of thfise duties in his sporting, sports 
without crime ; and to punish him would be gross and 
scandalous tyranny. . . 

The next alteration which we would propose is, thai 
game should be made property ; that is, that everj 
man should have a right to the game found upon hu 
land— and that the violation of it should be punished as 
poaching now is, by pecuniary penalties, and summa- 
ry conviction before magistrates. This change in th<< 
game laws would be an additional defence of game 
for the landed proprietor has now no other remedj 
against the qualified intruder upon his game, than a* 



GAME LAWS. 



action at law for a trespass on the land ; and if the 
trespasser has received no notice, this can hardly be 
called any remedy at all. It is now no uncommon 
practice for persons who have the exterior, and per- 
haps the fortunes of gentlemen, as they are travelling 
from place to place, to shoot over manors where they 
have no property, and from which, as strangers, they 
cannot have been warned. In such a case (which we 
repeat again, is by no means one of rare occurrence), 
it would, under the reformed system, be no more diffi- 
cult for the lord of the soil to protect his game, than it 
would be to protect his geese and ducks. But though 
game should be considered as property, it should still 
be considered as the lowest species of property — be- 
cause it is in its nature more -vague and mutable than 
other species of property, and because depredations 
are carried on at a distance from the dwelling, and 
without personal alarm to the proprietors. It would 
be very easy to increase the penalties, in proportion 
to the number of offences committed by the same indi- 
vidual. 

The punishments which country gentlemen expect 
by making game property, are punishments affixed to 
offences of a much higher order ; but country gentle- 
men must not be allowed to legislate exclusively on 
this, more than on any other subject. The very men- 
tion of hares and partridges in the country, too often 
puts an end to common humanity and common sense. 
Game must be protected ; but protected without vio- 
lating those principles of justice, and that adaptation 
of punishment to crime, which (incredible as it may 
appear) , are of infinitely greater importance than the 
amusemements of country gentlemen. 

We come now to the sale of game. — The foundation 
on which the propriety of allowing this partly rests, is* 
the impossiibility of preventing it. There exists, and 
has sprung up since the game laws, an enormous mass 
of wealth, which has nothing to do with land. Do the 
country gentlemen imagine that it is in the power of 
human laws to deprive the three per cents of phea- 
sants ? That there is upon earth, air, or sea, a single 
flavour (cost what crime it may to procure it), that 
mercantile opulence will not procure ? Increase the 
difficulty, and you enlist vanity on the side of luxury ; 
and make that to be sought for as a display of wealth, 
which was before valued only for the gratification of 
appetite. The law may multiply penalties by reams. 
Squires may fret and justices may commit, and game- 
keepers and poachers continue their nocturnal wars. 
There must be game on Lord Mayor's day, do what 
you will. You may multiply the crimes by which it 
is procured ; but nothing can arrest its inevitable pro- 
gress, from the wood of the esquire to the spit of the 
citizen. The late law for preventing the sale of game 
produced some little temporary difficulty in London 
at the beginning of the season. The poulterers were 
alarmed and came to some resolutions,, but the alarm 
soon began to subside, and the difficulties to vanish. 
In another season the law will be entirely nugatory 
and forgotten. The experiment was tried of increased 
severity ; and a law passed to punish poachers with 
transportation who were caught poaching in the night 
time with arms. What has the consequence been ? — 
Not ft cessation of poaching, but a succession of vil- 
lage guerillas ; an internecive war between gamekeep- 
ers and marauders of game ; — the whole country flung 
into brawls and convulsions, for the unjust and exorbi- 
tant pleasures of country gentlemen. The poacher 
hardly believes he is doing any wrong in taking par- 
tridges and pheasants. He would admit the justice of 
being transported for stealing sheep ; and his courage 
in such a transaction would be impaired by a con- 
sciousness he was doing wrong : but he has no such 
feeling in taking game ; and the preposterous punish- 
ment of transportation makes him desperate, and not 
timid. Single poachers are gathered into large compa- 
nies for their mutual protection ; and go out, not only 
with the intention of taking game, but of defending 
what they take with their lives. Such feelings soon 
produce a rivalry of personal courage, and the thirst of 
revenge between the villagers and the agents of power. 
We extract the following passages on this subject 
from the Thr?e Letters on the Game Laws : 



' The first and most palpable effect has naturally been aa 
exaltation of all the savage and desperate features in the poach- 
er's character. The war between him and the gamekeeper has 
necessarily become a " helium internecivum." A marauder may 
hesitate perhaps at killing his fellow man, when the alternative 
is only six months' imprisonment in the county jail; but when 
the alternative is to overcome the keeper, or to be torn from his 
family and connections, and sent to hard labour at the Antipodes 
we cannot be much surprised that murders and midnight com- 
bats have considerably increased this season; or that informa- 
tion such as the following has frequently enriched the columns 
of the country newspapers. 

' " Poaching. — Richard Barnett was on Tuesday convicted 
before Richard Clutterbuck, Esq., of keeping and using engines 
or wires for the destruction of game in the parish of Dunkerton, 
and fined £5. He was taken into custody by C. Coates, keeper 
to Sir Charles Bamfylde, Bart., who found upon him 17 wire- 
snares. The new act that has just passed against these illegal 
practices, seems only to have irritated the offenders, and made 
them more daring and desperate. The following is a copy of an 
anonymous circular letter, which has been received by several 
magistrates, and other eminent characters in this neighborhood. 
1 " Take notice. — We have lately heard and seen that there 
is an act passed, and whatever poacher is caught destroying the 
game is to be transported for seven years. — This is English 
liberty ! 

' " Now, we do swear to each other, that the first of our com- 
pany that this law is inflicted on, that there shall not one gentle- 
man's seat in our country escape the rage of fire. We are nine 
in number, and we will burn every gentleman's house of note. 
The first that impeaches shall be shot. We have sworn not to 
impeach. You may think it a threat, but they will find it rea- 
lity. The game-laws were too severe before. The Lord of all 
men sent these animals for the peasants as well as for the prince. 
God will not let his people be oppressed. He will assist us in 
our undertaking, and we will execute it with caution." ' — Bath 
paper. 

' " Death of a Poacher. — On the evening of Saturday se'en- 
night, about eight or nine o'clock, a body of poachers, seven in 
number, assembled by mutual agreement on the estate of the 
Hon. John Dutton, at Sherborne, Gloucestershire, for the pur- . 
pose of taking hares and other game. With the assistance of two 
dogs, and some nets and snares which they had brought with 
them, they had succeeded in catching nine hares, and were car- 
rying them away, when they were discovered by the game- 
keeper and sevenothers who were engaged with him in patrc* 
ing the different covers, in order to protect the game from 
nightly depredators. Immediately on perceiving the poachers, 
the keeper summoned them in a civil and peaceable manner to 
give up their names, dogs, implements, &c. they had with them, 
and the game they had taken ; at the same time assuring them 
that his party had fire-arms (which were produced for the pur- 
pose of convincing and alarming them), and representing to 
them the folly of resistance, as, in the event of an affray, they 
must inevitably be overpowered by superior numbers, even 
without fire-arms, which they were determined not to resort to 
unless compelled in self-defence. Notwithstanding this remon- 
strance of the keeper, the men unanimously refused to give up 
on any terms, declaring that if they were followed, they would 
give them a " brush,", and would repel force by force. The 
poachers then directly took off their great coats, threw them 
down with the game, &c, behind them, and approached the 
keepers in an attitude of attack. A smart contest instantly en- 
sued, both parties using only the sticks or bludgeons they car- 
ried : and such was the confusion during the battle, that some of 
the keepers were occasionally struck by their own comrades in 
mistake for their opponents. After they had fought in this 
manner about eight or ten minutes, one of the poachers, named 
Robert Simmons, received a violent blow upon his left temple, 
which felled him to the ground, where he lay, crying out mur- 
der, and asking for mercy. The keepers very humanely desired 
that all violence might cease on both sides : upon which three of 
the poachers took to flight and escaped, and the remaining 
three, together with Simmons, were secured by the keepers. 
Simmons, by the assistance of the other men, walked to the 
keeper's house, where he was placed in a chair : but he soon 
after died. His death was no doubt caused by the pressure of 
blood upon the brain, occasioned by the rupture of a vessel from 
the blow he had received. The three poachers who had been 
taken were committed to Northleach prison. The inquest upon 
the body of Simmons was taken on Monday, before W. Trigge, 
Gent., Coroner ; and the above account is extracted from the 
evidence given upon that occasion. The poachers were all 
armed with bludgeons, except the deceased, who had provided 
himself with the thick part of a flail, made of firm, knotted crab- 
tree, and pointed at the extremity, in order to thrust with, if 
occasion required. The deceased was an athletic, muscular 
man, very active, and about twenty-eight years of age. He re 
sided at Bowie, in Oxfordshire, and has left a wife, but no child 
The three prisoners were heard in evidence ; and all concurred 
in stating that the keepers were in no way blameable, and attri- 
buted their disaster to their own indiscretion and imprudence. 
Several of the keepers' party were so much beat as to be now 
confined to their beds. The two parties are said to be total 
strangers to each other, consequently no malice prepense conld 



WORKS OF THE REV. SIDNEY SMITH. 



have sxisted between them ; and as it appeared to the jury, after 
a most minute and deliberate investigation, that the confusion 
during the affray was so great, that the deceased was as likely to 
be struck by one of his own party as by the keepers', they 
returned a verdict of— Manslaughter against some person or 
persons unknown." ' 

• Wretched as the first of these productions is, I think it 
scarcely to be denied, that both its spirit and its probable conse- 
quences are wholly to be ascribed to the exasperation naturally 
consequent upon the severe enactment just alluded to. And the 
last case is at least a strong proof that severity of enactment is 
quite inadequate to correct the evil.' — (p. 356-359.) 

Poaching will exist in some degree, let the laws be 
what they may ; but the most certain method of check- 
ing the poacher seems to be by underselling him. It 
game can be lawfully sold, the quantity sent to market 
will be increased, the price lowered, and, with that, 
the profits and temptations of the poacher. Not only 
would the prices of the poacher be lowered, but we 
much doubt if he would find any sale at all. Licenses 
to sell game might be confined to real poulterers, and 
real occupiers of a certain portion of land. It might 
be rendered penal to purchase it from any but licensed 
persons ; and in this way the facility of the lawful, 
and the danger of the unlawful trade, would either 
annihilate the poacher's trade, or reduce his prices so 
much, that it would be hardly worth his while to carry 
it on. What poulterer in London, or in any of the 
large towns, would deal with poachers, and expose 
himself to indictment for receiving stolen goods, when 
he might supply his customers at fair prices by deal- 
ing with the lawful proprietor of game i Opinion is of 
more power than law. Such conduct would soon be- 
come infamous; and every respectable tradesman 
would be shamed out of it. The consumer himself 
would rather buy his game of a poulterer at an in- 
crease of price, than pick it up clandestinely, and at 
a great risk, though a somewhat smaller price, from 
porters and booth-keepers. Give them a chance of 
getting it fairly, and they will not get it unfairly. At 

{>resent, no one has the slightest shame at violating a 
aw which every body feels to be absurd and unjust. 

Poultry-houses are sometimes robbed ; — but stolen 
poultry is rarely offered to sale ; — at least, nobody 
pretends that the shops of poulterers, and the tables 
of moneyed gentlemen, are supplied by these means. 
Out of one hundred geese that are consumed at Mi- 
chaelmas, ninety-nine come into the jaws of the con- 
sumer by honest means ; — and yet, if it had pleased 
the country gentlemen to have goose laws as well as 
game laws; — if goose-keepers had been appointed, 
and the sale and purchase of this savoury bird pro- 
hibited, the same enjoyments would have been pro- 
cured by the crimes and convictions of the poor ; and 
the periodical gluttony of Michaelmas have been ren- 
dered as guilty and criminal, as it is indigestible and 
unwholesome. Upon this subject we shall quote a 
passage from the very sensible and spirited letters 
before us. 

• In favourable situations, game would be reared and preser- 
ved for the express purpose of regularly supplying the market 
in fair and open competition ; which would so reduce its price, 
that I see no reason why a partridge should be dearer than 
a rabbit, or a hare and pheasant than a duck or goose. This is 
about the proportion of price which the animals bear to each 
other in France, where game can be legally sold, and is regu- 
larly brought to market ; and where, by the way, game is as 
plentiful as in any cultivated country in Europe. The price 
so reduced would never be enough to compensate the risk and 
penalties of the unlawful poacher, who must therefore be dri- 
ven out of the market. Doubtless, the great poulterers of 
London and the commercial towns, who are the principal insti- 
gators of poaching, would cease to have any temptation to 
continue so, as they would fairly and lawfully procure game 
for their customers at a cheaper rate from the regular breed- 
ers. ' They would, as they now do for rabbits and wild fowl, 
contract with persons to rear and preserve them for the regu- 
lar supply of their shops, which would be a much more commo- 
dious and satifactory, and less hazardous way for them, than 
the irregular and dishonest and corrupting methods now pur- 
sued. It is not saying very much in favour of human nature 
to assert,that men in respectable stations of society had rather 
procure the same ends by honest than dishonest means. Thus 
would all the temptations to offend against the game-laws, 
arising from the change of society, together with the long 
ohain of moral and political mischiefs, at once disappear. 



' But then, in order to secure a sufficient breed of game for 
the supply of the market, in fair and open competition, it will 
be necessary to authorize a certain number of persons, likely 
to breed game for sale, to take and dispose of it when reared at 
their expense. For this purpose, I would suggest the propriety 
of permitting by law occupiers of land to take and kill game, 
for sale or otherwise, on their own occupations only, unless, (if 
tenants) they are specifically prohibited by agreement with 
their landlord; reserving the game and the power of taking it 
to himself, (as is now frequently done in leases.) This per- 
mission should not, of course, operate during the current lea- 
ses, unless by agreement. With this precaution, nothing 
could be fairer than such an enactment ; for it is certainly at 
the expense of the occupier that the game is raised and main- 
tained : and unless he receive an equivalent for it, either by 
abatement of rent upon agreement, or by permission to take 
and dispose of it, he is certainly an injured man. Whereas it 
is perfectly just that the owner of the land should have the 
option either to increase his rent by leaving the disposal of his 
game to his tenant, or vice versa. Game would be held to be 
(as in fact it is) an outgoing from the land, like tithe and other 
burdens, and therefore to be considered in a bargain ; and the 
land would either be let game-free, or a special reservation of 
it made by agreement. 

' Moreover, since the breed of game must always depend 
upon the occupier of the land, who may, and frequently does, 
destroy every head of it, or prevent its coining to maturity, 
unless it is considered in his rent ; the license for which I am 
now contending, by affording an inducement to preserve the 
breed in particular spots, would evidently have a considerable 
effect in increasing the stock of game in other parts, and in the 
country at large. There would be introduced a general sys- 
tem of protection depending upon individual interest, instead 
of a general system of destruction. I have, therefore, very 
little doubt that the provision here recommended would, upon 
the whole, add facilities to the amusements of the sportsman, 
rather than subtract from them. A sportsman without land 
might also hire from the occupier of a large tract of land the 
privilege of shooting over it, which would answer to the latter 
as well as sending his game to the market. In short, he might 
in various ways get a return, to which he is well entitled for 
the expense and trouble incurred in rearing and preserving 
that particular species of stock upon his laud.' — (p. 337 — 339.) 

There are sometimes 400 or 500 head of game killed '■ 
in great manors on a single day. We think it highly 
probable, the greater part of this harvest (if the game 
laws were altered) would go to the poulterer, to pur- 
chase poultry or fish for the ensuing London season. 
Nobody is so poor and so distressed as men of very 
large fortunes, who are fond of making an unwise dis- 
play to the world ; and if they had recourse to these 
means of supplying game, it is impossible to suppose 
that the occupation of the poacher could be continued. 
— The smuggler can compete with the spirit-merchant, 
on account of the great duty imposed by the revenue , 
but where there is no duty to be saved, the mere thief 
— the man who brings the article to market with an 
halter round his neck — the man of whom it is disrepu- 
table and penal to buy — who hazards life, liberty, and 
property, to procure the articles which he sells ; such 
an adventurer can never be long the rival of him who 
honestly and fairly produces the articles in which he 
deals. — Fines, imprisonments, concealment, loss of 
character, are great deductions from the profits of any 
trade to which they attach, and great discouragements 
to its pursuit. 

It is not the custom at present for gentlemen to sell 
their game ; but the custom would soon begin, and 
public opinion soon change. It is not unusual for men , 
of fortune to contract with their gardeners to supply 
their own table, and to send the residue to market, or 
to sell their venison ; and the same thing might be 
done with the manor. If game could be bought, it 
would not be sent in presents : — barn-door fowls are 
never so sent, precisely for this reason. 

The price of game would, under the system of laws 
of which we are speaking, be further lowered by the 
introduction of foreign game, the sale of which, at 
present prohibited, would tend very much to the pre- 
servation of English game by underselling the poacher 
It would not be just, if it were possible, to confine 
'any of the valuable productions of nature to the use of 
one class of men, and to prevent them from becoming 
the subject of barter, when the proprietor wished so 
to exchange them. It would be just as reasonable 
that the consumption of salmon should be confined to 
the proprietors of that sort of fishery — that the use of 
charr should be limited to the ^habitants of the la*e» 



BOTANY BAT. 



83 



—that nr aritime Englishmen should alone eat oysters 
and lobsters, as that every other class of the com- 
munity than landowners should be prohibited from 
the acquisition of game. 

It will be necessary, whenever the game laws are 
revised, that some of the worst punishments now in- 
flicted for an infringement of these laws should be re- 
pealed. To transport a man for seven years, on ac- 
count of partridges, and to harass a poor wretched 
peasant in the Crown Office, are very preposterous 
punishments for such offences ; humanity revolts 
against them — they are grossly tyrannical — and it is 
disgraceful that they should be suffered to remain on 
our statute books. But the most singular of all abuses, 
is the new class of punishments which the squirarchy 
have themselves enacted against depredations on 
game. The law says, that an unqualified man who 
kills a pheasant, shall pay five pounds ; but the squire 
says he shall be shot ; — and accordingly he places a 
spring-gun in the path of the poacher, and does all he 
can to take away his life. The more humane and 
mitigated squire mangles him with traps ; and the 
supra-fine country gentleman only detains him in ma- 
chines, which prevent his escape, but do not lacerate 
their captive. Of the gross illegality of such proceed- 
ings, there can be no reasonable doubt. Their immo- 
rality and cruelty are equally clear. If they are not 
put down by some declaratory law, it will be absolute- 
ly necessary that the judges, in their invaluable cir- 
cuits of Oyer and Terminer, should leave two or three 
of his majesty's squires to a fate too vulgar and in- 
delicate to be alluded to in this journal. 

Men have certainly a clear right to defend their pro- 
perty ; but then it must be by such means as the law 
allows : — their houses by pistols, their fields by actions 
for trespass, their game by information. There is an 
end of law, if every man is to measure out his punish- 
ment for his own wrong. Nor are we able to distin- 
guish between the guilt of two persons, — the one of 
whom deliberately shoots a man whom ne sees in 
his fields — the other of whom purposely places such 
instruments as he knows will shoot trespassers upon 
his fields. Better that it should be lawful to kill a 
trespasser face to face, than to place engines which 
will kill him. The trespasser may be a child — a wo- 
man — a son or friend. The spring-gun cannot ac- 
commodate itself to circumstances, — the squire or the 
game-keeper may. 

These, then, are our opinions respecting the altera- 
tions in the game laws, which, as they now stand, are 
perhaps the only system which could possibly render 
the possession of game so very insecure as it now is. 
We would give to every man an absolute property in 
the game upon his land, with full power to kill — to 
permit others to kill — and to sell ; — we would punish 
any violation of that property by summary conviction, 
and pecuniary penalties — rising in value according to 
the number of offences. This would of course abolish 
all qualifications ; and we sincerely believe it would 
lessen the profits of selling game illegally, so as very 
materially to lessen the number of poachers. It would 
make game, as an article of food, accessible to all 
classes, without infringing the laws. It would limit 
the amusement of country gentlemen within the 
boundaries of justice — and would enable the magis- 
trate cheerfully and conscientiously to execute laws, 
of the moderation and justice of which he must be tho- 
roughly convinced. To this conclusion, too, we have 
no doubt we shall come at the last. After many years 
of scutigeral folly — loaded prisons* — nightly battles — 
poachers tempted — and families ruined, these princi- 
ples will finally prevail, and make law once more co- 
incident with reason and justice. 

* In the course of the last year, no fewer than twelve hun- 
dred persons were committed for offences against the game ; 
besides those who ran away from their families for the fear of 
commitment. This is no slight quantity of misery. 



BOTANY BAY. (Edinburgh jIeview, 1810.) 

1. A Statistical, Historical, and Political Description of the 
Colony of New South Wales, and its dependent Settlements 
in Van Diemen's Land: with a particular Enumeration of 
the Advantages which these Colonies offer for Emigration, 
and their Superiority in many respects over those possessed 
by the United States of America. By W. C. Went worth, Esq., 
a Native of the Colony. Whittaker. London, 1819. 

2. Letter to Viscount Sidmouth, Secretary of State for the 
Home Department, on the Transportation Laws, the State of 
the Hulks, and of the Colonies in New South Wales. By the 
Hon. Henry Grey Bennet, M. P. Ridgway. London, 1819. 

3. O'Hara's History of New South Wales. Hatchard. London, 
1818. 

This land of convicts and kangaroos is beginning to 
rise into a very fine and flourishing settlement : — And 
great indeed must be the natural resources, and splen- 
did the endowments of that land that has been able to 
survive the system of neglect* and oppression expe- 
rienced from the mother country, and the series of ig- 
norant and absurd governors that have been selected 
for the administration of its affairs. But mankind 
live and flourish not only in spite of storms and tem- 
pests, but (which could not have been anticipated pre- 
vious to experience) in spite of colonial secretaries ex- 
pressly paid to watch over their interests. The supine- 
ness and profligacy of public officers cannot always 
overcome the amazing energy with which human be- 
ings pursue their happiness, nor the sagacity with 
which they determine on the means by which that 
end is to be promoted. Be it our care, however, to re- 
cord for the future inhabitants of Australasia, the po- 
litical sufferings of their larcenous forefathers ; and let 
them appreciate, as they ought, that energy which 
founded a mighty empire in spite of the afflicting blun- 
ders and marvellous caececonomy of their govern- 
ment. 

Botany Bay is situated in a fine climate, rather Asi- 
atic *han European, — with a great variety of temper- 
ature, — but favourable on the whole to health and life. 
It, conjointly with Van Diemen's Land, produces 
coal in great abundance, fossil salt, slate, lime, plum- 
bago, potter's clay ; iron ; white, yellow, and brilliant 
topazes ; alum and copper. These are all the impor- 
tant fossil productions which have been hitherto dis- 
covered : but the epidermis of the country has hardly 
as yet been scratched ; and it is most probable that 
the immense mountains which divide the eastern and 
western settlements, Bathurst and Sydney, must 
abound with every species of mineral wealth. The 
harbours are admirable ; and the whoje world, per- 
haps, cannot produce two such as those of Port Jack- 
son and Derwent. The former of these is land-locked 
for fourteen miles in length, and of the most irregular 
form : its soundings are more than sufficient for the 
largest ships ; and all the navies of the world might 
ride in safety within it. In the harbour of Derwent 
there is a road-stead forty-eight miles in length, com- 
pletely land-locked ; — varying in breadth from eight 
to two miles, — in depth from thirty to four fathoms, — 
and affording the best anchorage the whole way. 

The mean heat, during the three summer months, 
December, January, and February, is about 80° at 
noon. The heat which such a degree of the thermo- 
meter would seem to indicate, is considerably temper- 
ed by the sea-breeze, which blows with considerable 
force from nine in the morning till seven in the eve- 
ning. The three autumn months are March, April, 
and May, in which the thermometer varies from 55° 
at night to 75° at noon. The three winter months are 
June, July, and August. During this interval, the 
mornings and evenings are very chilly, and the nights 
excessively cold ; hoar-frosts are frequent ; ice, half 
an inch thick, is found twenty miles from the coast ; 
the mean temperature, at daylight, is from 40° to 45°, 
and at noon from 55° to 60°. In the three months of 

One and no small excuse for the misconduct of colonial 
secretaries is, the enormous qr mtity of business by which they 
are distracted. There shoul' be two or three colonial secre- 
taries instead of one : the office is dreadfully overweighted* 
The government of the colonies is commonly a series of blun 
ders. 



S4 



WORKS OF THE REV. SIDNEY SMITH. 



spring the thermometer varies from 60° to 70°. The 
climate to the westward of the mountains is colder. 
Heavy falls of snow take place during the winter ; the 
frosts are more severe, and the winters of longer du- 
ration. All the seasons are much more distinctly 
marked, and resemble much more those of this coun- 
try. 

Such is the climate of Botany Bay; and, in this re- 
mote part of the earth, Nature (having made horses, 
oxen, ducks, geese, oaks, elms, and all regular and 
useful productions for the rest of the world) , seems 
determined to have a bit of play, and to amuse her- 
self as she pleases. Accordingly, she makes cherries 
with the stone on the outside ; and a monstrous ani- 
mal, as tall as a grenadier, with the head of a rabbit, 
a tail as big as a bed-post, hopping along at the rate 
of five hops to a mile, with three or four young kan- 
garoos looking out of its false uterus to see what is 
passing. Then comes a quadruped as big as a large 
cat, with the eyes, colour, and skin of a mole, and the 
bill and web-feet of a duck — puzzling Dr. Shaw, and 
rendering the latter half of his life miserable, from his 
utter inability to determine whether it was a bird or a 
beast. Add to this a parrot, with the legs of a sea- 
gull ; a skate with the head of a shark ; and a bird of 
such monstrous dimensions, that a side bone of it will 
dine three real carnivorous Englishmen ; — together 
with many other productions that agitate Sir Joseph, 
and fill him with mingled emotions of distress and de- 
light. 

The colony has made the following progress : — 



Stock in 1788 


Stock 


in 


1817. 




Horned Cattle 5 


Do. 






44,753 


Horses - - 7 


Do. 




. 


3,072 


Sheep - 29 


Do. 


- 


- 


170,920 


Hogs ... 74 


Do. 


- 


- 


17,842 


Land in cultivation - acres. Do. 


- 


- 


47,564 


Inhabitants - - 1000 


Do. 


- 


- 


20,379 



The colony has a bank, with a capital of 20,0001. ; a 
newspaper ; and a capital (the town of Sydney) con- 
taining about 7000 persons. There is also a Van Die- 
men's Land Gazette. The perusal of these newspa- 
pers, which are regularly transmitted to England, and 
may be purchased in London, has afforded us conside- 
rable amusement. Nothing can paint in a more more 
lively manner the state of the settlement, its disadvan- 
tages, and prosperities, and the opinions and manners 
which prevail there. 

'On Friday, Mr. James Squires, settler and brewer, waited 
on his excellency at Government House, with two vines of 
hops taken from fiis own grounds, &c. — As a public recom- 
pense for the unremitted attention shown by the grower in 
bringing this valuable plant to such a high degree of perfec- 
tion, his excellency has directed a cow to be given to Mr. 
Squires from the government herd.' — O'Hara, p. 255. 

4 To Parents and Guardians. 

4 A person who flatters herself her character will bear the 
strictest scrutiny, being desirous of receiving into her charge a 
proposed number of children of her own sex, as boarders, re- 
spectfully acquaints parents and guardians that she is about 
to situate herself either in Sydney or Paramatta, of which no- 
tice will be shortly given. She doubts not, at the same time, 
that her assiduity in the inculcation of moral principles in the 
youthful mind, joined to an unremitting attention and polite 
diction, will insure to her the much-desired confidence of 
those who may think proper to favour her with such a charge. 
— Inquiries on the above subject will be answered by G. Howe, 
at Sydney, who will make known the name of the advirtiser.' 
-(p. 270.) 

4 Lost, 

(supposed to be on the governor's wharf,) two small keys, a 

tortoise-shell comb, and a packet of papers. Whoever may 

have found them, will, on delivering thein to the printer, re- 

ceire a refard of half a gallon of spirits.' — (p. 272.) 

4 To the Public. 

* As we nave no certainty of an immediate supply of paper, 
ws cannot promise a publication next week.'— (p. 290.) 

1 Fashionable Intelligence, Sept. 7*4. 
« On Tuesday bis excellency the late governor, and Mrs. 



King, arrived in town from Paramatta ; and yesterday Mrs 
King returned thither, accompanied by Mrs. Putland.'— {Ibid 5 

4 To be sold by private Contract, by Mr. Bevan. 

4 An elegant four-wheeled chariot, with plated mounted 
harness for four horses complete ; and a handsome lady's side- 
saddle and bridle. May be viewed, on application to Mr. Be- 
van.'— (p. 347.) 

4 From the Derwent Star. 
4 Lieutenant Lord, of the Royal Marines, who, after the 
death of Lieutenant-Governor Collins, succeded to the com 
mand of the settlement at Hobart Town, arrived at Port Jack- 
son in the Hunter, and favours us with the perusal of the 
ninth number published of the Derwent Star and Van Die- 
men's Land Intelligencer from which we copy the following 
extracts.'— (p. 353.) 

4 A Card. 
4 The subscribers to the Sydney Race Course are informed 
that the Stewards have made arrangements for two balls dur- 
ing the race week, viz. on Tuesday and Thursday.— Tickets, 
at Is. 6d. each, to be had at Mr. E. Wills's, George Street.— 
An ordinary for the subscribers and their friends each day of 
the races, at Mr. Wills's.— Dinner on table at five o'clock.'— 
(p. 356.) 

4 The Ladies' Cup. 
4 The ladies' cup, which was of very superior workmanship, 
won by Chase, was presented to Captain Richie by Mrs. 
M'Quarie ; who, accompanied by his excellency, honoured each 
day's race with her presence, and who, with her usual affa- 
bility, was pleased to preface the donation with the following 
short address.—" In the name of the Ladies of New South 
Wales, I have the pleasure to present you with this cup. 
Give me leave to congratulate you on being the successful can- 
didate for it ; and to hope that it is a prelude to future suc- 
cess, and lasting prosperity." ' — (p. 357.) 

4 Butchers. 
4 Now killing, at Matthew Pimpton's, Cumberland street, 
Rocks, beef, mutton, pork, and lamb. By retail, . 4d. per. 
lib. Mutton by the carcass, Is. per. lib. sterling, or 14d. cur- 
rency ; warranted to weigh from 10 lib. to 12 lib. per quarter. 
Lamb per ditto.— Captains of ships supplied at the wholesale 
price, and with punctuality.— If. B. Beef, pork, mutton, and 
lamb, at E Lamb's Hunter street, at the above prices' — (p. 
37ft) 

4 Salt Pork and Flair from Otaheite. 

4 On sale, at the warehouse of Mrs. S. Willis, 96 George 
street, a large quantity of the above articles, well cured, being 
the Mercury's last importation from Otaheite. The terms per 
cask are lOd, per. lib. sterling, or Is. currency.— N. B. For the 
accommodation of families, it will be sold in quantities not kts 
than 112 lib.'— (p. 377.) 

4 Painting.— A Card. 
4 Mr. J. W. Lewin begs leave to inform his friends and the 
public in general, that he intends opening an academy for 
painting on the days of Monday, Wednesday, and Friday .from 
the hours of 10 to 12 in the forenoon.— Terms 5s. a lesson • En- 
trance 20s.— N. B. The evening academy for drawing continu- 
ed as usual.'— (p. 384.) 

4 Sale of Rams. 
4 Ten rams of the Merino breed, lately sold by auction from 
the flocks of John M'Arthur, Esq., produced upwards of 200 
guineas.'— (p. 388.) 

4 Mrs. Jones's Vacation Ball, December l'Hth. 
4 Mrs. Jones, with great respect, informs the parents and 
guardians of the young ladies entrusted to her tuition, that 
the vacation ball is fixed for Tuesday the 22d instant, at the 
seminary, No. 45 Castlereagh street, Sydney. Tickets 7s. 6d. 
each.'— (p. 388.) 

4 Sporting Intelligence. 
4 A fine hunt took place the 8th instant at the Nepean, of 
which the following is the account given by a gentleman pre- 
sent. 44 Having cast off by the government hut on the Nepean, 
and drawn the cover in that neighbourhood for a native Dog 
unsuccessfully, we tried the forest ground for a Kangaroo, 
which we soon found. It went off in excellent style along the 
sands by the river side, and crossed to the Cow-pasture Plains, 
running a circle of about two miles ; then re-crossed, taking a 
direction for Mr. Campbell's stock-yard, and from thence at 
the back of Badge Allen Hill to the head of Boorroobaham 
Creek, where he was headed ; from thence he took the main 
range of hills between the Badge Allen and Badge Allenabin- 



BOTANY BAY. 



<•«, in a straight direction for Mr. Throsby's farm, where the 
hounds ran into him ; and he was killed, after a good run of 
about two hours." — The weight of the animal was upwards of 
120 lib.'— (p. 380.) 

Of the town of Sydney, Mr. Wentworth observes, 
that there are in it many public buildings, as well as 
houses of individuals, that would not disgrace the best 
parts of London ; but this description we must take 
the liberty to consider as more patriotic than true. 
We rather suspect it was penned before Mr. Went- 
worth was in London ; for he is (be it said to his ho- 
nour) a native of Botany Bay. The value of lands (in 
the same spirit he adds) is half as great in Sydney as 
in the best situations in London ; and is daily increas- 
ing : The proof of this which Mr. Wentworth gives 
is, that l it is not a commodious house which can be 
rented for 100Z. per annum unfurnished.' The town 
of Sydney contains two good public schools, for the 
education of 224 children of both sexes. There are 
establishments also for the diffusion of education in 
every populous district throughout the colony ; the 
masters of these are allowed stipulated salaries from 
the Orphans' fund. Mr. Wentworth states that one- 
eighth part of the whole revenue of the colony is ap- 
propriated to the purposes of education ; — this eighth 
he compares to 2500/. Independent of these institutions, 
there is an Auxiliary Bible Society, a Sunday School, 
and several good private schools. This is as it should 
be ; the education of the poor, important everywhere, is 
indispensable at Botany Bay. Nothing but the earliest 
attention to the habits of children can restrain the er- 
ratic finger from the contiguous scrip, or prevent the 
hereditary tendency to larcenous abstraction. The 
American arrangements respecting the education of 
the lower order is excellent. Their unsold lands are 
surveyed, and divided into districts. In the centre of 
every district, an ample and well-selected lot is provi- 
ded for the support of future schools. We wish this 
had been imitated in New Holland ; for we are of opi- 
nion that the elevated nobleman, Lord Sidmouth, 
should imitate what is good and wise, even if the 
Americans are his teachers. Mr. Wentworth talks of 
15,000 acres set apart for the support of the Female 
Orphan Schools ; which certainly does sound a little 
extravagant : but then 50 or 100 acres of this reserve 
are given as a portion to each female orphan ; so that 
all this pious tract of ground will soon be married 
away. This dotation of woman, in a place where 
they are scarce, is amiable and foolish enough. There 
is a school for the education and civilization of the na- 
tives, we hope not to the exclusion of the children of 
convicts, who have clearly a prior claim upon public 
charity. 

Great exertions have been made in public roads and 
bridges. The present governor has wisely established 
toll-gates in all the principal roads. No tax can be 
more equitable, and no money more beneficially em- 
ployed. The herds of wild cattle have either perished 
through the long droughts, or been destroyed by the 
remote settlers. They have nearly disappeared ; and 
their extinction is a good rather than an evil. A very 
good horse for cart or plough may now be bought for 
bl. to 10Z.; working oxen for the same price ; fine 
young breeding ewes from U. to 3/., according to the 
quality of the fleece. So lately as 1808, a cow and 
calf were sold by public auction for 105/.; and the 
price of middling cattle was from 80/ . to 100/. A 
breeding mare was, at the same period, worth from 
150 to 200 guineas ; and ewes from 10/. to 20/. The 
inhabitants of New South Wales have now 2000 years 
before them of cheap beef and mutton. The price of 
land is of course regulated by its situation and quality. 
Four years past, an hundred and fifty acres of very in- 
different ground, about three quarters of a mile from 
Sydney, were sold, by virtue of an execution, in lots 
of 12 acres each, and averaged 14/. per acre. This is 
the highest price given for land not situated in a town. 
The general average of unimproved land is 51. per 
acre. In years when the crops have not suffered 
from flood or drought, wheat sells for 9s. per bushel ; 
maize for 3s. 6d.; barley for 5s.; oats for 4s. tfd.; pota- 
toes for 6$. per cwt. By the last accounts received 
from the colony, mutton and beef were 6d. per lib.; — 



ycal 8d.; pork 9d. Wheat 8s. dd. per bushel ; oats 4s., 
and barley 5s. per ditto. Fowls 4s. 6d. per couple ;— 
ducks 6s. per ditto ; geese 5s. each ; turkeys 7s. 6d, 
each ; eggs 2s. 6d. per dozen ; butter 2s. 6d. per lib.— 
There are manufacterers of coarse woollen cloths, 
hats, earthen-ware, pipes, salt, candles, soap. There 
are extensive breweries and tanneries ; and all sorts of 
mechanics and artificers necessary for an infant colo- 
ny. Carpenters, stone masons, bricklayers, wheel and 
plough wrights, and all the most useful description of 
artificers, can earn from 8s. to 10s. per day. Great 
attention has been paid to the improvement of wool ; 
and it is becoming a very considerable article of ex- 
port to this country. 

The most interesting circumstance in the accounts 
lately received from Botany Bay, is the discovery of 
the magnificent river on the western side of the Blue 
Mountains. The public are aware, that a fine road 
has been made from Sydney to Bathurst, and a new 
town founded at the foot of the western side of these 
mountains, a distance ef 140 miles. The country in 
the neighbourhood of Bathurst has been described as 
beautiful, fertile, open, and eminently fit for all the 
purposes of a settlement. The object was to find a 
river ; and such an one has been found, the description 
of which it is impossible to read without the most 
lively interest. The intelligence is contained in a 
despatch from Mr. Oxley, surveyor-general of the 
settlement, to the governor, dated 30th August, 1817. 

1 " On the 19th, we were gratified by falling in with a 
river running through a most beautiful country, and which 
I would have been well contented to have believed the 
river we were in search of. Accident led us down to this 
stream about a mile, when we were surprised by its junc- 
tion with a river coming from the south, of such width and 
magnitude, as to dispel all doubts as to this last being the 
river we had so long anxiously looked for. Short as our 
resources were, we could not resist the temptation this 
beautiful country offered us to remain two days on the junc- 
tion of the river, for the purpose of examining the vicinity 
to as great an extent as possible. 

' " Our examination increased the satisfaction we had 
previously felt. A& far as the eye could reach in every 
direction, a rich and picturesque country extended, abound- 
ing in limestone, slate, good timber, ana every other re 
quisite that could render an uncultivated country desirable. 
The soil cannot be excelled ; whilst a noble river of the 
first magnitude affords the means of conveying its produc- 
tions from one part to the other. Where I quitted it, its 
course was northerly ; and we were north of the parallel 
of Port Stevens, being in latitude 32° 45' south, and 148° 
53 ' east longitude. 

'"It appeared to me that the Macquarrie had taken a 
north-northwest course from Bathurst, and that it must 
have received immense accessions of water in its course 
from that place. We viewed it at a period best calculated 
to form an accurate judgment of its importance, when it 
was neither swelled by floods beyond its natural and usual 
height, nor contracted within its limits by summer droughts. 
Of its magnitnde when it should have received the streams 
we had crossed, independent of any it may receive from 
the east, which, from the boldness and height, of the coun- 
try, I presume, must be at least as many, some idea may 
be formed, when at this point it exceeded, in breadth and 
apparent depth, »the Hawkesbury at Windsor. Many of 
the branches were of grander and more extended propor- 
tion than the admired one on the Nepean river from the 
Warragambia to Emu plains. 

1 " Resolving to keep as near the river as possible during 
the remainder of our course to Bathurst, and endeavour to 
ascertain, at least on the west side, what waters fell into it, 
on the 22d we proceeded up the river ; and, between the 
point quitted and Bathurst, crossed the sources of number- 
less streams, all running into the Macquarrie. Two of 
them were nearly as large as that river itself at Bathurst. 
The country from whence all these streams derive their 
source was mountainous and irregular, and appeared 
equally so on the east side of the Macquarrie. This de- 
scription of country extended to the immediate vicinity of 
Bathurst ; but to the west of those lofty ranges the country 
was broken into low grassy hills and fine valleys, watered 
by rivulets rising on the west side of the mountains, which, 
on their eastern side, pour their waters directly into the 
Macquarrie. 

* " These westerly streams appeared to me to join that 
which I had at first sight taken for the Macquarrie ; and, 
when united, fall into it at the point at which it was first 
discovered on the 19th inst. 

1 "We reached this place last evening, without a single 
accident having occurred during the whole progress of the 



WORKS OF THE REV. SIDNEY SMITH. 



expedition, which from this point has encircled, with the 
parallels of 34° 0' south and 32° south, and between the 
meridians of 149° 43' and 143° 40' east, a space of nearly 
one thousand miles." ' — Wentworth, pp. 72 — 75. 

The nsarest distance from the point at which Mr. 
Oxley left off, to any part of the western coast, is 
very little short of 2000 miles. The Hawkesbury, at 
Windsor (to which he compares his new river in mag- 
nitude,) is 250 yards in breadth, and of sufficient depth 
to float a 74-gun ship. At this point it has 2000 miles 
oi a straight line to reach the ocean ; and if it winds 
as rivers commonly do wind, it has a space to flow 
over of between 5000 and 6000 miles. The course and 
direction of the river have since become the object of 
two expeditions, one by land under Mr. Oxley, the 
other by sea under Lieutenant King, to the results ot 
which we look forward with great interest. Enough 
of the country on the western side of the Blue Moun- 
tains has been discovered, to show that the settlement 
has been made on the wrong side. The space be- 
tween the Mountains and the Eastern Sea is not above 
40 miles in breadth, and the five or six miles nearest 
the coast are of very barren land. The country, on 
the other side, is boundless, fertile, well watered, and 
of very great beauty. The importance of such a river 
as the Macquarrie is incalculable. We cannot help 
remarking here, the courtly appellations in which Ge- 
ography delights ; — the river Hawkesbury; — the town 
of Windsor on its banks ; Bathurst Plains ; Nepean 
River. Shall we never hear of the Gulf of Tierney; — 
Brougham Point ; or the Straits of Mackintosh on the 
river Grey 1 

The mistakes which have been made in settling this 
fine colony are of considerable importance, and such 
as must very seriously retard its progress to power and 
opulence. The first we shall mention is the settle- 
ment on the Hawkesbury. Every work of nature has 
its characteristic defects. Marshes should be sus- { 
pected of engendering disease — a volcanic country of ! 
eruptions — rivers of overflowing. A very little por- 
tion of this kind of reflection would have induced the 
disposers of land in New South Wales to have become 
a little better acquainted with the Hawkesbury before 
they granted land on its banks, and gave that direc- 
tion to the tide of settlement and cultivation. It turns 
out that the Hawkesbury is the embouchure through 
which all the rain that falls on the eastern side of the 
Blue Mountain makes its way to the sea ; and accord- 
ingly, without any warning, or any fall of rain on the 
settled part of the river, the stream has often risen 
from 79 to 90 feet above its common level. 

1 These inundations often rise seventy or eighty feet 
above low water mark ; and in the instance of what is still 
emphatically termed "the great flood," attained an eleva- 
tion of ninety-three feet. The chaos of confusion and dis- 
tress that presents itself on these occasions cannot be easily 
conceived by any one who has not been a witness of its 
horrors. An immense expanse of water, of which the eye 
cannot in many directions discover the limits everywhere 
interspersed with growing timber, and crowded with poul- 
try, pigs, horses, cattle, stacks, and houses, having fre- 
quently men, women, and children, clinging to them for 
protection, and shrieking out in an agony of despair for 
assistance : — such are the principal objects by which these 
scenes of death and devastation are characterized. 

'These inundations are not periodical, but they most 
generally happen in the month of March. Within the last 
two years there have been no fewer than four of them, 
one of which was nearly as high as the great flood. In the 
six years preceding, there had not been one. Since the 
establishment of the colony, they have happened, upon an 
average, about once in three years. 

"The principal cause of them is the contiguity of this 
river to the Blue Mountains. The Grose and Warragambia 
rivers, from which two sources it derives its principal sup- 
ply, issue direct from these mountains; and the Nepean 
river, the other principal branch of it, runs along the base 
of them for fifty or sixty miles ; and receives, in its progress, 
from the innumerable mountain torrents connected with it, 
tne whole of the rain which these mountains collect in that 
great extent. That this is the principal cause of these cala- 
mitous inundations has been fully proved; for shortly after 
the plantation of this colony, the Hawkesbury overflowed 
its banks (which are in general about thirty feet in height,) 
in the midst of harvest, when not a single drop of rain had 
fallen on the Port Jackson side of the mountains. Another 
great cause of the inundations which take place in this and 



the other rivers in the colony is the small fall that is m 
them, and the consequent slowness of their currents. The 
current in the Hawkesbury, even when the tide is in full 
ebb, does not exceed two miles an hour. The water, there- 
fore, which during the rains rushes in torrents from the 
mountains, cannot escape with sufficient rapidity ; and 
from its immense accumulation soon overtops the banks of 
the river^ and covers the whole of the low country." — 
Wentworth, pp. 24—26. 

It appears to have been a great oversight not to have 
built the town of Sydney upon a regular plan. Ground 
was granted, in the first instance, without the least at- 
tention to this circumstance ; and a chaos of pigstyes 
and houses was produced, which subsequent governors 
have found it extremely difficult to reduce to a state of 
order and regularity. 

Regularity is of consequence in planning a metropo- 
lis ; but fine buildings are absurd in the infant state of 
any country. The various governors have unfortu- 
nately displayed rather too strong a taste for archi- 
tecture — forgetting that the real Palladio for Botany 
Bay, in its present circumstances, is he who keeps out 
the sun, wind, and rain, with the smallest quantity of 
bricks and mortar. 

The appointment of Governor Bligh appears to have 
been a very serious misfortune to the colony — at such 
an immense distance from the mother country, with 
such an uncertainty of communication, and with a po- 
pulation so peculiarly circumstanced. In these extra- 
ordinary circumstances, the usual jobbing of the trea- 
sury should really be laid aside, and some little atten- 
tion paid to the selection of a proper person. It is 
common, we know, to send a person who is somebody's 
cousin ; but when a new empire is to be founded, the 
treasury should send out, into some other part of the 
town, for a man of sense and character. 

Another very great absurdity which has been com- 
mitted at Botany Bay, is the diminution of theii 
strength and resources, by the foundation of so many 
subordinate settlements. No sooner had the settlers 
unpacked their boxes at Port Jackson, than a fresh 
colony was settled in Norftflk Island under Lieutenant 
King, which was afterwards abandoned, after conside- 
rable labour and expense, from the want of a harbour: 
besides four or five settlements on the main land, two 
or three thousand persons, under a lieutenant-govern- 
or, and regular officers, are settled in Van Dieman's 
Land. The difficulties of a new colony are such, that 
the exertions of all the arms and legs are wanted 
merely to cover their bodies and fill their bellies : the 
passage from one settlement to another, necessary for 
common intercourse, is a great waste of strength ; ten 
thousand men, within a given ompass, will do much 
more for the improvement of a country than the same 
number spread over three times the space — will make 
more miles of road, clear more acres of wood, and 
build more bridges. The judge, the wind-mill, and 
the school, are more accessible ; and one judge, one 
wind-miD, and one school, may do instead of two ; — 
there is less waste of labour. We do not, of course, 
object to the natural expansion of a colony over un- 
cultivated lands ; the more rapidly that takes place, 
the greater is the prosperity of the settlement ; but we 
reprobate the practice of breaking the first population 
of a colony, by the interposition of government, into 
small detached portions, placed at great intervals. It 
is a bad economy of their resources ; and as such, is 
very properly objected to by the committee of the 
House of Commons. 

This colony appears to have suffered a good deal 
from the tyranny as Avell as the ignorance of its go- 
vernors. On the 7th of December, 1816, Governor 
Macquarrie issued the following order : 

' His excellency is also pleased further to declare, order, 
and direct, that in consideration of the premises, the under 
mentioned sums, amounts, and charges, and no more, witii 
regard to and upon the various denominations of work, 
labour, and services, described and set forth, shall be 
allowed, claimed, or demandable within this territory and 
its dependencies in respect thereof.'— Wentworth, pp. 105, 
106. 

And then follows a schedule of every species of la- 
bour, to each of which a maximum is affixed. We 



BOTANY BAT. 



sr 



have only to observe, that a good stout inundation of 
the Hawkesbury would be far less pernicious to the 
industry of the colony than such gross ignorance and 
absurdity as this order evinces. Young surgeons are 
examined in Surgeon's Hall on the methods of cutting 
off legs and arms before they are allowed to practise 
surgery. An examination on the principles of Adam 
Smith, and a license from Mr. Ricardo, seem to be 
almost a necessary preliminary for the appointment 
of governors. We must give another specimen of Go- 
vernor Macquarrie's acquaintance wirh the principles 
of political economy. 

■ General Orders. 
'His excellency has observed, with much concern, that at 
the present time of scarcity, most of the garden ground at- 
tached to the allotments, whereon different descriptions of 
persons build huts, are totally neglected, and no vegetable 
growing thereon — as such neglect in the occupiers, points 
them out as unfit to profit by such indulgence, those who do 
not put the garden ground attached to the allotments they 
occupy in cultivation, on or before the 10th day of July next, 
will be disposed (except in cases wherein ground is held by 
lease), and more industrious persons put in possession of them, 
as the present necessities of the settlement require every exer- 
tion being used to supply the wants of families, by the ground 
attached to their dwellings being made as productive as possi- 
ble. By command of his excellency. G. Blaxwell, Sec. 
Government House, Sydney, June 21st, 1806." — O'Hara, p. 275. 

This compulsion to enjoy this despotic benevolence, 
is something quite new in the science of government. 

The sale of spirits was first of all monopolized by 
the government, and then let out to individuals, for 
the purpose of building an hospital. Upon this sub- 
ject, Mr. Bennet observes, — 

' Heretofore all ardent spirits brought to the colony were 
purchased by the government, and served out at fixed prices 
to the officers, civil and military, according to their ranks ; 
hence arose a discreditable and baneful trade on the part of 
these officers, their wives and mistresses. The price of spirits 
at times was so high, that one and two guineas have been given 
for a single bottle. The thirst after ardent spirits became a 
mania among the settlers : all the writers on the state of the 
colony, and all who have resided there, and have given testi- 
mony concerning it, describe this rage and passion for drunk- 
enness as prevailing in all classes, and as being the principal 
foundation of all the crimes committed there. This extrava- 
grant propensity to drunkenness was taken advantage of by tho 
governor, to aid him in the building of the hospital. Mr. Went- 
worth, the surgeon, Messrs. Riley and Blaxwell, obtained 
permission to enter a certain quantity of spirits; they were to 
pay a duty of five or seven shillings a gallon on the quantity 
they introduced, which duty was to be set apart for the erec- 
tion of the hospital. To prevent any other spirits from being 
landed, a monopoly was given to these contractors. As soon 
as the agreement was signed, these gentlemen sent off to Rio 
Janeiro, the Mauritius, and the East Indies, for a large quantity 
of rum and arrack, which they could purchase at about the rate 
of 2s. or 2s. 6d. per gallon, and disembarked it at Sydney. From 
there being but few houses that were before permitted to sell 
this poison, they abounded in every street; and such was the 
enormous consumption of spirits, that money was soon raised 
to build the hospital, which was finished in 1814. Mr. Marsden 
informs us, that in the small town of Paramatta thirteen houses 
were licenced to deal in spirits, though he should think that 
five at the utmost would be amply sufficient for the accommo- 
dation of the public' — Bennet, pp. 77 — 79. 

The whole coast of Botany Bay and Van Dieman's 
Land abounds with whales ; and accordingly the duty 
levied upon train oil procured by the subjects in New 
South Wales, or imported there, is twenty times 
greater than that paid by the inhabitants of this coun- 
try: the duty on spermaceti oil, imported, is sixty 
times greater. The duty levied on train oil, sperma- 
ceti, and head matter, procured by the inhabitants of 
Newfoundland, is only three times the amount of that 
which is levied on the same substance procured by 
British subjects residing in the United kingdom. The 
duty levied on oil procured by British subjects residing 
in the Bahama or Bermuda islands, or in the plantations 
of North America, is only eight times the amount on 
train oil, and twelve times the amount on spermaceti, 
of that which is levied on the same substances taken 
by British subject^ within the United Kingdom. The 
duty, therefore, which \s payable on train oil in vessels 
belonging to this colony is neariy seven times greater 
than that which is payable on the same description of 



oil taken in vessels belonging to the island of New* 
foundUand, and considerably more than double of that 
which is payable on the same commodity taken in 
vessels belonging to the Bahama or Bermuda islands, 
or to the plantations in North America ; while the 
duty which is levied on spermaceti oil, procured in 
vessels belonging to this colony, is five times the 
amount of that which is levied on vessels belonging 
to the above-mentioned places, and twenty times the 
amount of that which is levied on vessels belonging to 
Newfoundland. The injustice of this seems to us to 
be quite enormous. The statements are taken from 
Mr. Wentworth's book. 

The inhabitants of New South Wales have no trial 
by jury ; the governor has not even a council to re- 
strain him. There is impcrsed in this country a very 
heavy duty on timber and coals exported ; but for 
which, says Mr. Wentwo'rth, some hundred tons of 
these valuable productions would have been sent an- 
nually to the Cape of Good Hope and India, since the 
vessels which have been in the habit of trading be- 
tween those countries and the colony have always re- 
turned in ballast. The owners and consignees would 
gladly have shipped cargoes ot timber and coals, if 
they could have derived the most minute profit from 
the freight of them. 

The Australasians grow corn ; and it is necessarily 
their staple. The Cape is their rival in the corn trade. 
The food of the inhabitants of the East Indies is rice ; the 
voyage to Europe is too distant for so bulky an article 
as corn. The supply to the government stores furnish- 
ed the cultivators of New South Wales with a market 
in the first instance, which is now become too insigni- 
ficant for the great excess of the" supply above the con- 
sumption. Population goes on with immense rapidity; 
but while so much new and fertile land is before them, 
the supply continues in the same proportion greater 
than the demand. The most obvious method of afford- 
ing a market for this redundant corn, is by encouraging 
distilleries within the colony ; a measure repeatedly 
pressed upon the government at home, but hitherto as 
constantly refused. It is a measure of still greater 
importance to the colony, because its agriculture is 
subjected to the effects both of severe drought and 
extensive inundations, and the corn raised for the dis- 
tillers would be a magazine in times of famine. A 
recommendation to this effect was long since made by 
a committee of the House of Commons ; but, as it was 
merely a measure for the increase of human comforts, 
was stuffed into the improvement baskets, and forgot- 
ten. There has been in all governments a great deal 
of absurd canting about the consumption of spirits. 
We believe the best plan is to let people drink what 
they like, and wear what they like ; to make no sump. 
tuary laws either for the belly or the back In the 
first place, laws against rum and rum water are made 
by men who can change a wet coat for a dry one 
whenever they choose, and who do not often work up 
to their knees in mud and water ; and, in the next 
place, if this stimulus did all the mischief it is thought 
to do by the wise men of claret, its cheapness and 
plenty would rather lessen than increase the avidity 
with which it is at present sought for. 

The governors of Botany Bay have taken the liberty 
of imposing what taxes they deemed proper, without 
any other authority than their own ; and it seemed 
very frivolous and vexatious not to allow this small 
effusion of despotism in so remote a corner of the 
globe : but it was noticed by the opposition in the 
House of Commons, and reluctantly confessed and 
given up by the administration. This great portion of 
the earth begins civil life with noble principles of free- 
dom : — may God grant to its inhabitants that wisdom 
and courage which are necessary for the preservation 
of so great a good ! 

Mr. Wentworth enumerates, among the evils to 
which the colony is subjected, that clause in the last 
settlement of the East India Company's charter, which 
prevents vessels of less than three hundred tons bur« 
then from navigating the Indian seas ; a restriction 
from which the Cape of Good Hope has been lately 
liberated, and which ought, in the same manner, to 
be removed from New South Wales, where there can- 



86 



WORKS OF THE REV. SIDNEY SMITH. 



not be for many years to come, sufficient capital to 
build vessels of so large a burthen. 

' The disability,' says Mr. Wentworth, ' might be removed by 
a simple order in council. Whenever his majesty's govern- 
ment shall have freed the colonists from this useless and cruel 
prohibition, the following branches of commerce would then 
be open to them. First, they would be enabled to transport, 
in their own vessels, their coals, timbers, spars, flour, meat, 
&c. to the Cape of Good Hope, the Isle of France, Calcutta, 
and many other places in the Indian seas ; in all of which, 
markets more or less extensive exist for those various other 
productions which the colony might furnish. Secondly, they 
would be enabled to carry direct to Canton the sandal wood, 
beche la mer, dried seal skins, and, in fact, all the numerous 
productions which the surrounding seas and islands afford lor 
the China market, and return freighted with cargoes of tea, 
»i Iks, nankeens, &c; all of which commodities are in great 
demand in the colony, and are at present altogether furnished 
by East India or American merchants, to the great detriment 
and dissatisfaction of the colonial. And, lastly, they would be 
enabled, in a short time, from the great increase of capital 
which these important privileges would of themselves occasion, 
as well as attract from other countries, to open the fur-trade 
with the north-west coast of America, and dispose of *he car- 
goes procured in China — a trade which has hitherto oeen car- 
ried on by the Americans and Russians, although the colonists 
possess a local superiority for the prosecution of this valuable 
branch of commerce, which would insure them at least a .suc- 
cessful competition with subjects of those two nations. — Went- 
worth, pp. 317, 318. 

The means which Mr. Wentworth proposes for im- 
proving the condition of Botany Bay, are — trial by 
jury ; colonial assemblies, with whom the right of 
taxation should rest ; the establishment of distilleries, 
and the exclusion of foreign spirits ; alteration of du- 
ties, so as to place New South. Wales upon the same 
footing as other colonies ; removal of the restriction 
to navigate the Indian seas in vessels of a small bur- 
then ; improvements in the courts of justice ; encou- 
ragement for the growth of hemp, flax, tobacco, and 
wine ; and if a colonial assembly cannot be granted, 
that there should be no taxation without the authority 
of parliament. 

In general, we agree with Mr. Wentworth in his 
statement of evils, and in the remedies he has pro- 
posed for them. Many of the restrictions upon the 
commerce of N ew South Wales are so absurd that 
they require only to be stated in Parliament to be cor- 
rected. The fertility of the colony so far exceeds its 
increase of population, and the difficulty of finding a 
market for corn is so great — or rather the impossibi- 
lity so clear — that the measure of encouraging domes- 
tic distilleries ought to be had recourse to. The 
colony, with a soil fit for every thing, must, as Mr. 
Wentworth proposes, grow other things besides corn, 
and excite that market in the interior which it does 
not enjoy from without. The want of demand, in- 
deed, for the excess of corn, will soon effect this with- 
out the intervention of goverment. Government, we 
believe, have already given up the right of taxation 
without the sanction of Parliament ; and there is an 
end, probably, by this time, to that grievance. A coun- 
cil and a colonial secretary they have also expressed 
their willingness to concede. Of trial by jury, and a co- 
lonial assembly, we confess that we have great doubts. 
At some future time they must come, and ought to 
come. The only question is, is the colony fit for such 
institutions at present ? Are there a sufficient num- 
ber of respectable persons to serve that office in the 
various settlements ? If the English law is be to fol- 
lowed exactly, to compose a jury of twelve persons, 
a pannel of forty-eight must be summoned. Could 
forty-eight intelligent, unconvicted men, be found in 
every settlement of New South Wales ? or must they 
not be fetched from great distances, at an enormous 
expense and inconvenience? Is such an institution 
calculated for so very young a colony ? A good go- 
vernment is an excellent thing ; but it is not the first 
in the order of human wants. The first want is to 
subsist ; the next to subsist in freedom and comfort ; 
first to live at all, then to live well. A parliament is 
still a greater demand upon the wisdom and intelli- 
gence and opulence of a colony, than trial by jury. 
Among the twenty thousand inhabitants of New South 
Wales, are there ten persons out of the employ of 
government whose wisdom and prudence could rea- 



sonably be expected to advance the interests of the 
colony without embroiling it with the mother-coun- 
try ? Who has leisure, in such a state of affairs, to 
attend such a parliament ? Where wisdom and con- 
duct are so rare, every man of character, we will ven- 
ture to say, has, like strolling players in a barn, six 
or seven important parts to perform. Mr. M'Arthur, 
who, from his character and understanding, would 
probably be among the first persons elected to the 
colonial legislature, besides being a very spirited agri- 
culturist, is, we have no doubt, justice of the peace, 
curator and rector of a thousand plans, charities, and 
associations, to which his presence is essentially ne- 
cessary. If he could be cut into as many pieces as a 
tree is into planks, all his subdivisions would be emi- 
nently useful. When a member of Parliament, and 
what is called a really respectable country gentleman, 
sets off to attend his duty, in our Parliament, such 
diminution of intelligence as is produced by his ab 
sence, is, God knows, easily supplied ; but in a colony 
of 20,000 persons, it is impossible this should be the 
case. Some time hence, the institution of a colonial 
assembly will be a very wise and proper measure, and 
so clearly called for, that the most profligate mem- 
bers of administration will neither be able to ridicule 
nor refuse it. At present we are afraid that a Botany 
Bay parliament would give rise to jokes ; and jokes 
at present have a great agency in human affairs. 

Mr. Bennet concerns himself with the settlement of 
New Holland, as it is a school fo* criminals ; and, 
upon this subject, has written a very humane, en- 
lightened, and vigorous pamphlet. The objections 
made to this settlement by Mr. Beni-it are, in the first 
place, its enormous expense. The colony of New 
South Wales, from 17SS to 1S15 in lusi.ve, has cost 
this country the enormous sum of 3,'. ti5,983/. In the 
evidence before the transportation ^rnmitcee, the 
annual expense of each convict, from 1791 to 1797, is 
calculated at 33/. 9s. b%d. per annum, tuid the profits 
of his labour are stated to be 20/. ThV ^rice paid foi 
the transport of convicts has been, on v,a tsera^e, Zll 
exclusive of food and clothing. It app*\iM ; however, 
says Mr. Bennet, by an account laid JU'.foire Parlia- 
ment, that in the year 1814, 109,746/. wwt* paid for 
the transport, feed, and clothing of ltflV convicts, 
which will make the cost amount to abo-at iC8/. per 
man. In 1S12, the expenses of the cdiuf were 
176,000/.; in 1813, 235,000/.; in 1814, 23i,iOW.; but 
in 1815, they had fallen to 150,000/. 

The cruelty and neglect in the transport' «uton of 
convicts have been very great — and in this *ay a 
punishment inflicted which it never was in tl\e con- 
templation of law to enact. During the first eight 
years, according to Mr. Bennet 's statements, one- 
tenth of the convicts died on the passage ; oa the 
arrival of three of the ships, 200 sick Avere landed, 
281 persons having died on board. These instances, 
however, of criminal inattention to the health of the 
convicts, no longer take place ; and it is mentioned 
rather as an history of what is past, than a censure 
upon any existing evil. 

In addition to the expense of Botany Bay, Mr. Ben- 
net contends that it wants the very essence of punish- 
ment, terror; that the common people do not dread 
it ; that instead of preventing crimes, it rather excites 
the people to their commission, by the hopes it affords 
of bettering their condition in a new country 

'All those who have had an opportunity of witnessing the 
effect of this system of transportation agree in opinion, that it 
is no longer an object of dread — it has, in fact, generally 
ceased to be a punishment: true it is, to a father of a family, 
to the mother who leaves her children, this perpetual separa 
tion from those whom they love and whom they support, is a 
cruel blow, and, when I consider the merciless character of the 
law which inflicts it, a severe penalty ; but by far the greater 
number of persons who suffer this punishment, regard it in 
quite a different light. Mr. Cotton, the ordinary of Newgate, 
informed the police committee last year, "that the generality 
of those who are transported consider it as a party of pleasure 
— as going out to see the world ; they evince no penitence, no 
contrition, but seem to rejoice in the thing— many of them to 
court it. I have heard them, when the sentence of transporta- 
tion has been passed by the recorder, return thanks for it, and 
seem overjoyed at their sentence' the very last party that 



CHARLES FOX. 



went off, when they were put into the caravan, shouted and 
nuzzaed, and were very joyous; several of them called out to 
the keepers who were there in the yard, the first fine Sunday 
we will have a glorious kangaroo hunt at the Bay — seeming 
to anticipate a great deal of pleasure." He was asked if those 
persons were married or single, and his answer was, " by far 
the greater number of them unmarried. Some of them are 
anxious that their wives and children should follow them; 
others care nothing about either wives or children, and are 
glad to get rid of them." ' — Bennet, pp. 60,61. 

It is a scandalous injustice in this colony, that per- 
sons transported for seven years, have no power of 
returning when that period is expired. A strong ac- 
tive man may sometimes work his passage home ; but 
what is an old man or aged female to do ? Suppose a 
convict were to be confined in prison for seven years, 
and then told he might get out if he could climb over 
the walls, or break open the locks, what in general 
would be his chance of liberation ? But no lock nor 
doors can be so secure a means of detention as the 
distance of Botany Bay. This is a downright trick 
and fraud in the administration of criminal justice. A 
poor wretch who is banished from his country for 
seven years, should be furnished with the means of 
returning to his country when these seven years are 
expired. If it is intended he should never return, his 
sentence should have been banishment for life. 

The most serious charge against the colony, as a 
place for transportation, and an experiment in crimi- 
nal justice, is the extreme profligacy of manners which 
prevails there, and the total want of reformation 
among the convicts. Upon this subject, except in the 
regular letters, officially varnished and filled with 
fraudulent beatitudes for the public eye, there is, and 
there can be, but one opinion. New South Wales is a 
sink of wickedness, in which the great majority of 
convicts of both sexes become infinitely more depraved 
than at the period of their arrival. How, as Mr. Ben- 
net very justly observes, can it be otherwise? The 
felon transported to the American plantations, became 
an insulated rogue among honest men. He lived for 
years in the family of some industrious planter, with- 
out seeing a picklock, or indulging in pleasant dia- 
logues on the delicious burglaries of his youth. He 
imperceptibly glided into honest habits, and lost not 
only the tact for pockets, but the wish to investigate 
their contents. But in Botany Bay, the felon, as soon 
as he gets out of the ship, meets with his ancient 
trull, with the footpad of his heart, the convict of his 
affections, the man whose hand he has often met in 
the same gentleman's pocket — the being whom he 
would choose from the whole world to take to the 
road, or to disentangle the locks of Bramah. It is 
impossible that vice should not become more intense 
in such society. 

Upon the horrid state of morals now prevalent in 
Botany Bay, we would counsel our readers to cast 
their eyes upon the account given by Mr. Marsden, in 
a letter, dated July, 1815, to Governor Macquarrie. — 
It is given at length in the appendix to Mr. Bennet's 
book. A more horrid picture of the state of any set- 
tlement was never penned. It carries with it an air 
of truth and sincerity, and is free from all enthusiastic 
cant. 

* I now appeal to your excellency,' (he says, at the conclusion 
of his letter,) 'whether, under such circumstances, any man of 
common feeling, possessed of the least spark of humanity or 
religion, who stood in the same official relation that I do to 
these people, as their spiritual pastor and magistrate, could 
enjoy one happy moment from the beginning to the end of the 
week?- 

' I humbly conceive that it is incompatible with the character 
and wish of the British nation, that her own exiles should be 
exposed to such privations and dangerous temptations, when 
she is daily feeding the hungry and clothing the naked, and 
receiving into her friendly, and I may add pious bosom, the 
stranger, whether savage or civilized, of every nation under 
heaven. There are, in the whole, nnder the two principal 
superintendents, Messrs. Rouse and Oakes, one hundred and 
eight men, and one hundred and fifty women, and several 
children ; and nearly the whole of them have to find lodgings 
for themselves when they have performed their governmeat 
tasks. 

' I trust that your excellency will be fully persuaded, that it 
is totally impossible for the magistrate to support his necessary 



authority, and to establish a regular police, under such a 
weight of accumulated and accumulating evils. I am as sensible 
as any man can be, that the difficulty of removing these evils 
will be very great ; at the same time, their number and influ- 
ence may be greatly lessened, if the abandoned male and 
female convicts are lodged in barracks, and placed under the 
eye of the police, and the number of licensed houses is re- 
duced. Till something of this kind is done, all attempts of the 
magistrate, and the public administration of religion, will be 
attended with little good. I have the honour to be your ex- 
cellency's most obedient humble servant, Samuel Marsden ' 
— Bennet, p, 104. 

Thus much for Botany Bay. As a mere colony, it 
is too distant and expensive ; and, in future, will of 
course involve us in many of those just and necessary 
wars, which deprive Englishmen so rapidly of their 
comforts, and make England scarcely worth living in. 
If considered as a place of reform for criminals, its 
distance, expense, and the society to which it dooms 
the objects of the experiment, are insuperable objec- 
tions to it. It is in vain to say, that the honest people 
in New South Wales will soon bear a greater propor 
tion to the rogues, — and the contamination of bad 
society will be less fatal. This only proves that it 
may be a good place for reform hereafter, not that it 
is a good one now. One of the principal reasons for 
peopling Botany Bay at all, was, that it would be an 
admirable receptacle, and a school of reform, for our 
convicts. It turns out, that for the first half century, 
it will make them worse than they were before, and 
that, after that period, they may probably begin to 
improve. A marsh, to be sure, maybe drained and 
cultivated; but no man who has his choice, would 
select it in the mean time for his dwelling-place. 

The three books are all books of merit. Mr. 0'- 
Hara's is a bookseller's compilation, done in a useful 
and pleasing manner. Mr. Wentworth is full of infor- 
mation on the present state of Botany Bay. The 
humanity, the exertions, and the genuine benevolence 
of Mr. Bennet, are too well known to need our com- 
mendation. 

All persons who have a few guineas in their pocket, 
are now running away from Mr. Nicholas Vansittart 
to settle in every quarter of the globe. Upon the 
subject of emigration to Botany Bay, Mr. Wentworth 
observes, 1st, that any respectable person emigrating 
to that colony, receives as much land gratis, as would 
cost him 400L in the United States ; 2dly, he is allow- 
ed as many servants as he may require, at one-third 
of the wages paid for labour in America ; 3dly, him- 
self and family are victualled at the expense of gov- 
ernment for six months. He calculates that a man,— 
wife, and two children, with an allowance of five tons 
for themselves and baggage, could emigrate to Botany 
Bay for 100Z., including every expense, provided a 
whole ship could be freighted ; and that a single man 
could be taken out thither for 301. These points are 
worthy of serious attention to those who are shedding 
their country. 



CHIMNEY SWEEPERS. (Edinburgh Review, 
1819.) 

Account of the Proceedings of the Society for superseding the 
Necessity of Climbing Boys. Baldwin, &c. London, 1816. 

An excellent and well-arranged dinner is a most pleas- 
ing occurrence, and a great triumph of civilized life. 
It is not only the descending morsel, and the envelop- 
ing sauce— but the rank, wealth, wit, and beauty 
which surround the meats— the learned management 
of light and heat— the silent and rapid services of the 
attendants— the smiling and sedulous host, proffering 
guests and relishes — the exotic bottles — the embossed 
plate — the pleasant remarks — the handsome dresses — 
the cunning artifices in fruit and farina ! The hour of 
dinner, in short, includes every thing of sensual and 
intellectual gratification which a great nation glories 
in producing. 

In the midst of all this, who knows that the kitchen 
chimney caught fire half an hour before dinner !— and 
that a poor little wretch, of six ox seven years old 



90 



WORKS OF THE REV. SIDNEY SMITH. 



was sent up in the midst of the flames to put it out ? 
We would not, previous to reading this evidence, have 
formed a conception of the miseries of these poor 
wretches, or that there should exist, in a civilized 
country, a class of human beings destined to such ex- 
treme and varied distress. We will give a short 
epitome of what is developed in the evidence before 
the two Houses of Parliament. 

Boys are made chimney sweepers at the early age 
of five or six. 

Little boys for small flues, is a common phrase in 
the cards left at the door by itinerant chimney sweep- 
ers. Flues made to ovens and coppers are often less 
than nine inches square ; and it may be easily con- 
ceived, how slender the frame of that human body 
■aiust be, which can force itself through such an aper- 
ture. 

'What is the age of the youngest boys who have been em- 
ployed in this trade, to your knowledge ? About five years of 
age : I know one now between five or six years old ; it is the 
man's own son in the Strand: now there is another atSomer's 
Town, I think, said he was between four and five, or about 
five; Jack Hall, a little lad, takes him about. — Did you ever 
know any female children employed ? Yes, I know one now. 
About two years ago there was a woman told me she had 
climbed scores of times, and there is one at Paddington now 
whose father taught her to climb : but I have often heard talk 
of them when I was apprentice, in different places. — What is 
the smallest-sized flue you have ever met with in the course 
of your experience ? About eight inches by nine ; these they 
are always obliged to climb in this posture (describing it), 
keeping the arms up straight ; if they slip their arms down, 
they get jammed in; unless they get their arms close over 
their head they cannot climb.' — Lords 1 Minutes, No. 1. p. 8. 

The following is a specimen of the manner in which 
they are taught this art of climbing chimneys : 

' * Do you remember being taught to climb chimneys ? Yes. — 
What did you feel upon the first attempt to climb a chimney ? 
The first chimney I went up, they told me there was some 
plumb-pudding and money up at the top of it, and that is the 
way they enticed me up ; and when I got up, I would not let 
the other boy get from under me to get at it ; I thought he 
would get it ; I could not get up, and shoved the pot and half 
the chimney down into the yard. Did you experience any in- 
convenience to your knees, or your elbows ? Yes, the skin 
was off my knees and elbows too, in climbing up the new 
chimneys they forced me up. — How did they force you up ? 
When I got up, I cried out about my sore knees. — Were you 
bfeator compelled to go up by any violent means? Yes, when 
I went to a narrow chimney, if I could not do it, I durst not go 
ome; when I used to couie down, my master would beat me 
with the brush ; and not only my master, but when we used to 
go with the journeymen, if we could not do it, they used to hit 
us three or four times with the brush.' — Lords' Minutes, No. 
1. p. 5. 

In practising the art of climbing, they are often 
crippled. 

' You talked of the pargetting to chimneys ; are many chim- 
neys pargetted? There used to be more than are now ; we 
used to have to go and sit all a-twist to parge them, according 
to the floors, to keep the smoke from coming out ; then I could 
not strengthen my legs ; and that is the reason that many are 
cripples, — from parging and stopping the holes.' — Lords' Min- 
utes, No. 1. p. 17. 

They are often stuck fast in a chimney, and, after 
remaining there many hours, are cut out. 

'Have you known, in the course of your practice, boys stick 
in chimneys at all ? Yes, frequently. — Did you ever know an 
instance of a boy being suffocated to death ? No ; I do not re- 
collect any one at present, but I have assisted in taking boys 
out when they have been nearly exhausted. — Did you ever 
know an instance of its being necessary to break open a chim- 
ney to take the boy out ? O yes. — Frequently ? Monthly I 
might say ; it is done with a cloak, if possible, that it should 
not be discovered : a master in general wishes it not to be 
known, and therefore speaks to the people belonging to the 
house not to mention it, for it was merely the boy's neglect ; 
they oftey say it was the boy's neglect. — Why do they say 
that ? The boy's climbing shirt is often very bad ; the boy 
coming down, if the chimney be very narrow, and numbers of 
them are only nine inches, gets his shirt rumpled underneath 
him, and he has no power after he is fixed in that way (with 
his hand up.) — Does a boy frequently stick in the chimney ? 
Yes, I have known more instances of that the last twelve- 
month than before. — Do you ever have to break open in the 



inside of a room? Yes, I have helped to break through into a 
kitchen chimney in a dining room.'— Lords' Minutes, p. 34. 

To the same effect is the evidence of John Daniels 
(Minutes, p. 100,) and of James Ludford (Lords' 
Minutes, p. 147.) 

• You have swept the Penitentiary? I have. — Did you ever 
know a boy stick in any of the chimneys there ? Yes, I have 
—Was it one of your boys? It was.— Was there one or two 
that stuck? Two of them.— How long did they stick there? 
Two hours.— How were they got out ? They were cut out*— 
Was there any danger while they were in that situation? It 
was the core from the pargetting of the chimney, and the rub- 
bish that the labourers had thrown down, that stopped them, 
and when they got it aside them, they could not pass. — They 
both stuck together? Yes.'— Lords' Minutes, p. 147. 

One more instance we shall give from the evidence 
before the Commons. 

'Have you heard of any accidents that have recently hap- 
pened to climbing boys in the small flues ? Yes ; I have often 
met with accidents myself when I was a boy ; there was lately 
one in Mary-le-bone, where the boy lost his life in a flue, a 
boy of the name of Tinsey (his father was of the same trade) ; 
that boy I think was about eleven or twelve years old. — Was 
there a coroner's inquest sat on the body of that boy you 
mentioned ? Yes, there was ; he was an apprentice of a man 
of the name of Gay. — How many accidents do you recollect, 
which were attended with loss of life to the climbing boys ? I 
have heard talk of many more than I know of; I never knew 
of more than three since I have been at the trade, but 1 have 
heard talk of many more. — Of twenty or thirty ? I cannot say ; 
I have been near losing my own life several times.' — Commons' 
Report, p. 53. 

We come now to burning little chimney sweepers 
A large party are invited to dinner — a great display is 
to be made ; and about an hour before dinner, there is 
an alarm that the kitchen chimney is on fire ! It is 
impossible to put off the distinguished personages 
who are expected. It gets very late for the soup and 
fish — the cook is frantic — all eyes are turned upon the 
sable consolation of the master chimney sweeper — and 
up into the midst of the burning chimney is sent one 
of the miserable little infants of the brush ! There is 
a positive prohibition of this practice, and an enactment 
of penalties in one of the acts of Parliament which 
respect chimney sweepers. But what matter acts of 
Parliament, when the pleasures of genteel people are 
concerned ? Or what is a toasted child, compared to 
the agonies of the mistress of the house with a de- 
ranged dinner ? 

' Did you ever know a boy get burnt up a chimney? \es. 
Is that usual? Yes, I have been burnt myself, and have got 
the scars on my legs ; a year ago I was up a chimney in Liquor 
Pond Street ; I have been up more than forty chimneys where 
I have been burnt. — Did your master or the journeymen ever 
direct you to go up a chimney that was on fire ? Yes, it is a 
general case. — Do they compel 3 r ou to go up a chimney that is 
on fire? Oh yes, it was the general practice for two of us to 
stop at home on Sunday to be ready in case of a chimney being 
a-fire. — You say it is general to compel the boys to go up 
chimneys on fire ? Yes, boys get very ill-treated if they do 
not go up.' — Lords' Minutes, p. 34. 

' Were you ever forced up a chimney on fire ? Yes, I was 
forced up one once, and, because I could not do it, I was taken 
home and well hided with a brush by the journeyman. — Have 
you frequently been burnt in ascending chimneys on fire ? 
Three times. — Are such hardships as you have described com- 
mon in the trade with other boys ? Yes, they are.' — Ibid. p. 
100. 

' What is the price for sending a boy up a chimney badly on 
fire? The price allowed is five shillings, but most of them 
charge half a guinea — Is any part of that given to the boy ? 
No, but very often the boy gets half a crown ; and then the 
journeyman has half, and his mistress takes the other part to 
take care of against Sunday. — Have you never seen water 
thrown down from the top of a chimney when it is on fire ? 
Yes. — Is not that generally done? Yes ; I have seen that done 
twenty times, and the boy in the chimney ; at the time when 
the boy has hallooed out, " It is so hot I cannot go any fur- 
ther ;" and then the expression is, with an oath, " Stop, and I 
will heave a pail of water down." '—Ibid. p. 39. 

Chimney sweepers are subject to a peculiar sort of 
cancer, which often brings them to premature death. 

' He appeared perfectly willing to try the machines every- 
where ? I must say the man appeared perfectly willing ; he 
had a fear that he and his family would be ruined by them , 
but I must say of him, that he is very different from ether 



CHIMNEY SWEEPERS. 



91 



sweeps I have seen ; he attends very much to his own busi- 
ness ; he was as black as any boy he had got, and unfortun- 
ately in the course of conversation he told me he had got a 
cancer ; he was a fine healthy strong looking man ; he told me 
he dreaded having an operation performed, but his father died 
of the same complaint, and his father was sweeper to King 
George the Second.' — Lords' Minutes, p. 84. 

1 What is the nature of the particular diseases ? The diseases 
that we particularly noticed, to which they were subject, were 
of a cancerous description. In what part ? The scrotum, in 
particular, &c. Did you ever hear of cases of that description 
that were fatal? No, I do not think them as altogether being 
fatal, unless they will not submit to the operation; they have 
such a dread of the operation that they will not submit to it, 
and if they do not let it be perfectly removed they will be lia- 
ble to the return of it. To what cause do you attribute that 
disease ? I think it begins from a want of care : the scrotum 
being in so many folds or crevices, the soot lodges iu them and 
creates an itching, and I conceive that, by scratching it and 
tearing it, the soot gets in and creates the irritability ; which 
disease we know by the name of the chimney sweeper's cancer, 
and is always lectured upon separately as a distinct disease. — 
Then the committee understands that the physicians who are 
entrusted with the care and management of those hospitals 
think that disease of such common occurrence, that it is neces 
sary to make it a part of surgical education ? Most assuredly 
I remember Mr. Cline and Mr. Cooper were particular on that 
subject. — Without an operation there is no cure ? I conceive 
not ; I conceive without the operation it is death ; for cancers 
are of that nature that unless you extirpate them entirely they 
will never be cured.' — Commons' Rep. p. 60, 61. 

In addition to the life they led as chimney sweepers, 
is superadded the occupation of nightmen. 

' (By a Lord.) Is it generally the custom that many mas- 
ters are likewise nightmen ? Yes ; I forgot that circumstance, 
which is very grievous ; I have been tied round the middle, 
and let down several privies, for the purpose of fetching 
watches, and such things; it is generally made the practice to 
take the smallest boy, to let him through the hole without 
taking up the seat, and to paddle about there until he finds it ; 
they do not take a big boy, because it disturbs the seat. — Lords' 
Minutes, p. 38. 

The bed of these poor little wretches is often the 
soot they have swept in the day. 

1 How are the boys generally lodged ; where do they sleep 
at night ? Some masters may be better than others, but I 
know I have slept on the soot that was gathered in the day 
myself.— Where do boys generally sleep ? Never on a bed ; 
I never slept on a bed myself while I was apprentice. — Do 
they sleep in cellars'? Yes, very often ; I have slept in the 
cellar myself on the sacks I took out. — What had you to cover 
you ? The same — Had you any pillow ? No further than my 
breeches and jacket under my head. — How were you clothed ? 
When I was apprentice we had a pair of leather breeches and 
a small flannel jacket. — Any shoes and stockings ? Oh dear no ; 
no stockings. — Had you any other clothes for Sunday ? 
Sometimes we had an old bit of a jacket, that we might wash 
out ourselves, and a shirt.' — Lords' Minutes, p. 40. 

Girls are occasionally employed as chimney sweep- 
ers. 

* Another circumstance, which has not been mentioned to 
the committee, is, that there are several little girls employed ; 
there are two of the name of Morgan at Windsor, daughters 
of the chimney-sweeper who is employed to sweep the chim- 
neys of the Castle ; another instance at Uxbridge, and at 
Brighton, and at Whitechapel, (which was some years ago,) 
and at Hadley near Barnet, and Witham in Essex, and else- 
where. — Commons' Report, p. 71. 

Another peculiar danger to which chimney sweepers 
are exposed, is the rottenness of the pots at the top 
of chimneys ; for they must ascend to the very sum- 
mit, and show their brushes above them, or there is 
no proof that the work is properly completed. These 
chimney-pots, from their exposed situation, are very 
subject to decay ; and when the poor little wretch has 
worked his way up to the top, pot and boy give way 
together, and are both shivered to atoms. There are 
many instances of this in the evidence before both 
Houses. When they outgrow the power of going up 
a chimney, they are fit for nothing else. The mise- 
ries they have suffered lead to nothing. They are not 
I only enormous, but unprofitable : having suffered, in 
what is called the happiest part of his life, every 
misery which an human being can suffer, they are 
then cast out to rob and steal, and given up to the 
law. 



Not the least of their miseries, while their trial en- 
dures, is their exposure to cold. It will easily be be* 
lieved that much money is not expended on the clothes 
of a poor boy stolen from his parents, or sold by them 
for a few shillings, and constantly occupied in dirty 
work. Yet the nature of their occupations renders 
chimney sweepers peculiarly susceptible of cold. And 
as chimneys must be swept very early, at four or five 
o'clock of a winter morning, the poor boys are shiver- 
ing at the door, and attempting by repeated ringings 
to rouse the profligate footman; but the more they 
ring the more the footman does not come. 

' Do they not go out in the winter without stockings ? Oh, 
yes. — Always? I never saw one go out with stockings; I 
have known masters make their boys pull off" their leggins, 
and cut off the feet, to keep their feet warm when they have 
chilblains. — Are chimney-sweepers' boys particularly subject 
to chilblains ? Yes ; I believe it is owing to the weather : they 
often go out at two or three in the morning, and their shoes 
are generally very bad.Q-Do they go out at that hour at 
Christmas? Yes; a man will have twenty jobs at four, and 
twenty more at five or six. — Are chimneys generally swept 
much about Christmas time ? Yes ; they are in general ; it is 
left to the Christmas freek. — Do you suppose it is frequent 
that, in the Christmas week, boys are out from three o'clock 
in the morning to nine or ten ? Yes, further than that ; I have 
known that a boy has been only in and out again directly all 
day till five o'clock in the evening. — Do you consider the 
journeymen and masters treat those boys generally with 
greater cruelty than other apprentices in other trades are 
treated ? They do, most horrid and shocking.' — Lords' Mi 
nutes, p. 33. 

The following is the reluctant evidence of a master. 

• At what hour in the morning did your boys go out upon 
their employment ? According to orders. — At any time ? To 
be sure ; suppose a nobleman wished to have his chimney done 
before four or five o'clock in the morning, it was done, or how 
were the servants to get their things done? — Supposing you 
had an order to attend at four o'clock in the month of Decem- 
ber, you sent your boy? I was generally with him, or had a 
careful follower with him. — Do you think those early hours 
beneficial for him ? I do ; and I have heard that " early to bed 
and early to rise, is the way to be healthy, wealthy, and wise." 
— Did they always get in as soon as they knocked ? No ; it 
would be pleasant to the profession if they could. — How long 
did they wait ? Till the servants please to rise. — How long 
might that be? According how heavy they were to sleep. — 
How long was that ? It is impossible to say ; ten minutes at 
one house, and twenty at another. — Perhaps half an hour? 
We cannot see in the dark how the minutes go. — Do you think 
it aealthy to let them stand there twenty minutes at four 
o'clock in the morning in the winter time? He has a cloth to 
wrap himself in like a mantle, and keep himself warm.' — 
Lords' Minutes, pp. 138, 139. 

We must not forget sore eyes. Soot lodges on their 
eyelids, produces irritability, which requires friction ; 
and the friction of dirty hands of course increases the 
disease. The greater proportion of chimney sweepers 
are in consequence blear-eyed. The boys are very 
small, but they are compelled to carry heavy loads of 
soot. 

'Are you at all lame yourself? No : but I am " knapped- 
kneed" with carrying heavy loads when I was an apprentice. 
— That was the occasion of it? It was. — In general, are per- 
sons employed in your trade either stunted or knock-kneed by 
carrying heavy loads during their childhood? It is owing to 
their masters a great deal ; and when they climb a great deal 
it makes them weak.' — Commons' Report, p. 58. 

In climbing a chimney, the great hold is by the 
knees and elbows. A young child of six or seven 
years old, working with knees and elbows against 
hard bricks, soon rubs off the skin from these bony 
projections, and is forced to climb high chimneys 
with raw and bloody knees and elbows. 

' Are boys' knees and elbows rendered sore when they first 
begin to learn to climb ? Yes, they are, and pieces out of 
them. — Is that almost generally the case ? It is ; there is not 
one out of twenty who is not ; and they are sure to take the 
scars to their grave : I have some now. — Are they usually 
compelled to continue climbing while those sores are open ? 
Yes ; the way they use to make them hard is that way. — 
Might not this severity be obviated by the use of pads in 
learning to climb ? Yes ; but they consider in the business, 
learning a boy, that he is never thoroughly learned until the 
boy's knees are hard after Deing sore ; then they consider it 
necessary to put a pad on, from seeing the boy have bad knees J 



WORKS OF THE REV. SIDNEY SMITH. 



the children generally walk stiff-kneed. — Is it usual among the 
chimney-sweepers to teach their boys to learn by means of 
pads? No ; they learn them with nearly naked knees.— Is it 
done in one instance in twenty ? No, nor one in fifty.' — Lords' 
Minutes, p. 32. 

According to the humanity of the master, the soot 
remains upon the bodies of the children, unwashed 
off, for any time from a week to a year. 

•Are the boys generally washed regularly? No, unless 
they wash themselves. — Did not your master take care you 
were washed ? No. — Not once in three months ? No, not once 
a year. — Did not he find you soap? No ; I can take my oath 
on the Bible that he never found me one piece of soap during 
the time I was apprentice.' — Lords 7 Minutes, p. 41. 

The life of these poor little wretches is so miserable, 
that they often lie sulking in the flues unwilling to 
come out. 

'Did you ever see severity usedio boys that were not obsti- 
nate and perverse ? Yes. — Very often ? Yes, very often. The 
boys are rather obstinate ; some of them are ; some of them 
will get half-way up the chimney, and will not go any further, 
and then the journeymen will swear at them to come down, or 
go on ; but the boys are too frightened to come down ; they 
halloo out, we cannot get up, and they are afraid to come 
down ; sometimes they will send for another boy, and drag 
them down ; sometimes get up to the top of the chimney, and 
throw down water, and drive them down ; then, when they 
get them down, they will begin to drag, or beat, or kick them 
about the house ; then, when they get home, the master will 
beat them all round the kitchen afterwards, and give them no 
breakfast, perhaps.' — Lords' Minutes, pp. 9, 10. 

When the chimney boy has done sufficient work for 
the master he must Avork for the man ; and he thus 
becomes for several hours after his morning's work a 
perquisite to the journeyman. 

* It is frequently the perquisite of the journeyman, when 
the first labour of the day on account of the master is 
finished, to "call the streets," in search of employment on 
their own account, with the apprentices, whose labour is 
thus unreasonably extended, and whose limbs are weakened 
and distorted by the weights which they have to carry, and 
by the distance which they have to walk. John Lawless 
says; " I have known a boy to climb from twenty to thirty 
chimneys for his master in the morning ; he has then been 
sent out instantly with the journeyman, who has kept him 
out till three or lour o'clock, till he has accumulated from 
six to eight bushels of soot."' — Lords' Report, p. 24. 

The sight of a little chimney sweeper often excites 
pity : and they have small presents made to them at 
the houses where they sweep. These benevolent 
alms are disposed of in the following manner : 

1 Do the boys receive little presents of money from people 
often in your trade? Yes, it is in general the custom. — Are 
they allowed to keep that for their own use? Not the 
whole of it, — the journeymen take what they think proper. 
They journeymen are entitled to half by the master's orders ; 
and whatever a boy may get, if two boys and one journey- 
man are sent to a large house to sweep a number of chim- 
neys, and after they have done, there should be a shilling, 
or eighteen pence given to the boys, the journeyman has 
his full half, and the two boys in general have tne other. — 
Is it usual or customary for the journeymen to play at chuck 
farthing or other games with the boys? Frequently. — Do 
they win the money from the boys? Frequently; the 
children give their money to the journeymen to screen for 
them. — What do you mean by screening? Such a thing as 
sifting the soot. The child is tired, and he says, " Jem, I 
will give you two-pence if you will sift my share of the 
soot;" there is sometimes twenty or thirty bushels to sift. 
Do you think the boys retain one quarter of that given them 
for their own use ? No.' — Lords' Minutes, p. 35. 

To this most horrible list of calamities is to be 
added the dreadful deaths by which chimney sweep- 
ers are often destroyed. Of these we once thought of 
giving two examples ; one from London, the other 
from our own town of Edinburgh ; but we confine our- 
selves to the latter. 

James Thomson, chimney sweeper. — One day in the begin- 
ning of June, witness and panel (that is, the master, the party 
accused) had been sweeping vents together. About four 
o'clock in the afternoon, the panel proposed to go to Albany 
fltreet, where the panel's brother was cleaning a vent, with 
the assistance of Fra6er, whom he had borrowed from the 

Eanel for the occasion. When witness and panel got to the 
ouse in Albany street, they found Fraser, who had gone uo 



the vent between eleven and twelve o'clock, not yet come down. 
On entering the house they found a mason making a hole in the i 
wall. Panel said, what was he doing ? I suppose he has taken . 
a lazy fit. The panel called to the boy, " What are you doing? 
what's keeping you?" The boy anwered that he could not 
come. The panel worked a long while, sometimes persuading 
him, sometimes threatening and swearing at the boy to get him 
down. Panel then said, " I will go to a hardware shop and I 
get a barrel of gunpowder, and blow you and the vent to the 
devil, if you do not come down." Panel then began to slap at 
the wall — witness then went up a ladder, and spoke to the boy 
through a small hole in the wall previously made by the mason 
— but the boy did not answer. Panel's brother told witness, to 
come down, as the boy's master knew best how to manage 
him. Witness then threw off his jacket, and put a handker- 
chief about his head, and said to the panel, let me go up the 
chimney to see what's keeping him. The panel made no an- 
swer, but pushed witness away from the chimney, and con- 
tinued bullying the boy. At this time the panel was standing 
on the grate, so that witness could not go up the chimney ; 
witness then said to panel's brother, there is no use for me 
here, meaning that panel would not permit him to use his • 
services. He prevented the mason making the hole larger, 
saying, Stop, and I'll bring him down in five minutes' time. 
Witness then put on his jacket, and continued an hour in the 
room, during all which time the panel continued bullying the 
boy. Panel then desired witness to go to Reid's house to get I 
the loan of his boy Alison. Witness went to Reid's house, and I 
asked Reid to come and speakjo panel's brother. Reid asked j 
if panel was there? Witness answered he was; Reid said he 
would send his boy to the panel, but not to the panel's brother. 
Witness and Reid went to Albany street ; and when they got 
into the room, panel took his head out of the chimney and 
asked Reid if he would lend him his boy ; Reid agreed ; wit- 
ness then returned to Reid's house for his boy, and Reid called 
after him, " Fetch down a set of ropes with you." By this time 
witness had been ten minutes in the room, during which time 
panel was swearing, and asking what's keeping you, you scoun- 
drel? When witness returned with the boy and the ropes, 
Reid took hold of the rope, and having loosed it, gave Alison 
one end, and directed him to go up the chimney, saying, do not 
go farther than his feet, and when 3'ou get there fasten it to 
his foot. Panel said nothing all this time. Alison went up, 
and having fastened the rope, Reid desired him to come down ; 
Reid took the rope and pulled, but did not bring down the 
boy ; the rope broke ! Alison was sent up again with the 
other end of the rope, which was fastened to the boy's foot. 
When Reid was pulling the rope, panel said, "You have not 
the strength of a cat;" he took the rope into his own hands, 
pulling as strong as he could. Having pulled about a quarter 
of an hour, panel and Reid fastened the rope round a crow 
bar, which they applied to the wall as a lever, and both pulled 
with all their strength for about a quarter of an hour longer, 
when it broke. During this time witness heard the boy cry, 
and say, " My God Almighty ! " Panel said, " If I had you 
here, I would God Almighty you." Witness thought the cries 
were in agony. The master of the house brought a new piece 
of rope, and the panel's brother spliced an eye on it. Reid 
expressed a wish to have it fastened on both thighs, to have 
greater purchase. Alison was sent up for this purpose, but 
came down and said he could not get it fastened. Panel then 
began to slap at the wall. After striking a long while at 
the wall, he got out a large stone ; he then put in his head 
and called to Fraser, "Do you hear, you sir?" but got no 
answer: he then put in his hands, and threw down deceased's 
breeches. He then came down from the ladder. At this 
time the panel was in a state of perspiration : he sat down 
on a stool, and the master of the house gave him a dram. 
Witness did not hear panel make any remarks as to the situa- 
tion of the boy Fraser. Witness thinks that, from panel's 
appearance, he knew that the boy was dead." — Commons' Re 
port, pp. 136—138. 

We have been thus particular in stating the case of 
the chimney sweepers, and in founding it upon the 
basis of facts, that we may make an answer to those 
profligate persons who are always ready to fling an 
air of ridicule upon the labours ol humanity, because - 
they are desirous that what they have not virtue to do i 
themselves, should appear to be foolish and romantic 
when done by others. A still higher degree of depra- • 
vity than this, is to want every sort of campassion for i 
human misery, when it is accompanied by filth, po- 
verty, and ignorance — to regulate humanity by the 
income tax, and to deem the bodily wretchedness and 
the dirty tears of the poor a fit subject for pleasantry 
and contempt. We should have been loath to believe, 
that such deep-seated and disgusting immorality ex- 
isted in these days ; but the notice of it is forced upon 
us. Nor must wepass over a set of marvellously weak 
gentlemen, who disepver democracy and revolution in 
every effort to improve the condition of the lower or 



AMERICA. 



93 



ders, and to take off a little of the load of misery from 
those points where it presses the hardest. Such are 
the men into whose heart Mrs. Fry has struck the 
deepest terror ; who abhor Mr. Bentham and his peni- 
tentiary ; Mr. Bennet and his hulks ; Sir James Mack- 
intosh and his bloodless assizes ; Mr. Tuke and his 
sweeping machines ; and every human being who is 
great and good enough to sacrifice his quiet to his love 
for his fellow creatures. Certainly we admit that hu- 
manity is sometimes the veil of ambition or of faction ; 
but we have no doubt that there are a great many ex- 
cellent persons to whom it is misery to see misery, 
and pleasure to lessen it ; and who, by calling the 
public attention to the worst cases, and by giving birth 
to judicious legislative enactments for their improve- 
ment, have made, and are making, the world some- 
what happier than they found it. Upon these princi- 
ples we join hands with the friends of the chimney 
sweepers, and most heartily wish for the diminution 
of their numbers, and the limitation of their trade. 

We are thoroughly convinced, there are many re- 
spectable master chimney sweepers ; though we sus- 
pect their numbers have been increased by the alarm 
which their former tyranny excited, and by the severe 
laws for their coercion : but even with good masters 
the trade is miserable — with bad ones it is not to be 
endured ; and the evidence already quoted, shows us 
how many of that character are to be met with in the 
occupation of sweeping chimneys. 

After all, we must own that it was quite right to 
throw out the bill for prohibiting the sweeping of 
chimneys by boys — because humanity is a modern in- 
vention ; and there are many chimneys in old houses, 
which cannot possibly be swept in any other manner. 
But the construction of chimneys should be attended 
to in some new building act ; and the treatment of 
boys be watched over with the most severe jealousy 
of the law. Above all, those who have chimneys ac- 
cessible to machinery, should encourage the use of 
machines,* and not think it beneath their dignity to 
take a little trouble, in order to do a great deal of 
good. We should have been very glad to have second- 
ed the views of the Climbing Society, and to have 
pleaded for the complete abolition of climbing boys, 
if we could have done so. But such a measure, Ave 
are convinced from the evidence, could not be carried 
into execution without great injury to property, and 
great increased risk of fire. The lords have investi- 
gated the matter with the greatest patience, humani- 
ty, and good sense ; and they do not venture, in their 
report, to recommend to the house the abolition of 
climbing boys. 



AMERICA. (Edinburgh Review, 1820.) 

Statistical Annals of the United States of America. By Adam 
Seybert. 4to. Philadelphia, 1818. 

This is a book of character and authority ; but it 
is a very large book ; and therefore we think we shall 
do an acceptable service to our readers, by presenting 
them with a short epitome of its contents, observing 
the same order which has been chosen by the author. 
The whole, we conceive, will form a pretty complete 
picture of America, and teach us how to appreciate 
that country, either as a powerful enemy or a profit- 
able friend. The first subject with which Mr. Seybert 
begins, is the population of the United States. 

Population. — As representatives and direct taxes 
are apportioned among the different states in propor- 
tion to their numbers, it is provided for in the Ameri- 
can constitution, that there shall be an actual enumera- 
tion of the people every ten years. It is the duty of 
the marshals in each state to number the inhabitants 
of their respective districts : and a correct copy of 
the lists, containing the names of the persons returned, 
must be set up in a public place within each district, 
before they are transmitted to the secretary of state : 
— they are then laid before Congress by the President. 
Under this act three census, or enumerations of the 
people, have been already laid before Congress — for 

The price of a machine is fifteen shillings. 



the years 1790, 1800, and 1810. In the year 1790, the 
population of America was 3,921 ,326 persons, of whom 
697,697 were slaves. In 1800, the numbers were 
5,319,762, of which 896,849 were slaves. In 1810, the 
numbers were 7,239,903, of whom 1,191,364 were 
slaves ; so that at a rate at which free population has 
proceeded between 1790 and 1810, it doubles itself, in 
the United States, in u very little more than 22 years. 
The slave population, according to its rate of proceed- 
ing in the same time, would be doubled in about 2Q 
years. The increase of the slave population in this 
statement is owing to the importation of negroes be 
tween 1S00 and 1808, especially in lS06and 1807, from 
the expected prohibition against importation. The 
number of slaves was also increased by the acquisi 
tions of territory in Louisiana, where they constituted 
nearly half the population. From 1801 to 1811, the 
inhabitants of Great Britain acquired an augmenta- 
tion of 14 per cent ; the Americans, within the same 
period were augmented 36 per cent. 

Emigration seems to be of very little importance to 
the United States. In the year 1817, by far the most 
considerable year of emigration, there arrived in ten 
of the principal ports of America, from the Old World, 
22,000 persons as passengers. The number of emi- 
grants, from 1790 to 1810, is not supposed to have ex- 
ceeded 6000 per annum. None of the separate States- 
have been retrogade during these three enumerations, 
though some have been nearly stationary. The most 
remarkable increase is that of New York, which has 
risen from 340,120 in the year 1790, to 959,049 in the 
year 1810. The emigration from the Eastern to the 
Western States is calculated at 60,000 persons per 
annum. In all the American enumerations, the males 
uniformly predominate in the proportion of about 100 
to 92. We are better off in Great Britain and Ireland, 
— where the women were to the men, by the census 
of 1811, as 110 to 100. The density of population in 
the United States is less than 4 persons to a square 
mile; that of Holland, in 1803, was 275 to the square 
mile ; that of England and Wales, 169. So that the 
fifteen provinces which formed the Union in 1810. 
would contain, if they were as thickly peopled as 
Holland, 135 millions souls. 

The next head is that of Trade and Commerce. — In 
1790, the Exports of the United States were above 19 
millions of dollars; in 1791, above 20 millions; in 
1792, 26 millions ; in 1793, 33 millions of dollars 
Prior to 1795, there was no discrimination, in the 
American treasury accounts, between the exportation 
of domestic, and the re-exportation of foreign articles. 
In 1795, the aggregate value of the merchandise ex- 
ported was 67 millions of dollars, of which the foreign 
produce re-exported was 26 millions. In 1800, the 
total value of exports was 94 millions ; in 1805, 101 
millions; and in 1808, when they arrived at their 
maximum, 108 millions dollars. In the year 1809, 
from the effects of the French and English Orders in 
Council, the exports fell to 52 millions of dollars ; in 
1810 to 66 millions; in 1811, to 61 millions. In the 
first year of the war with England, to 38 millions ; in 
the second to 27 ; in the year 1814, when peace was 
made, to 6 millions. So that the exports of the re- 
public, in six years, had tumbled down from 108 to 6 
millions of dollars: after the peace, in the years 
1815-16-17, the exports rose to 52, 81, 87 millions 
dollars. 

In 1817, the exportation of cotton was 85 millions 
pounds. In 1815, the sugar made on the banks of the 
Mississippi was 10 millions pounds. In 1792, when 
the wheat trade was at the maximum, a million and a 
half of bushels were exported. The proportions of the 
exports to Great Britain, Spain, France, Holland, and 
Portugal, on an average of ten years ending 1812, are 
as 27, 16, 13, 12, and 7; the actual value of exports to 
the dominions of Great Britain, in the three years 
ending 1804, were consecutively, in millions of dollars, 
16, 17, 13. 

Imports. — In 1791, the imports of the United States 
were 19 millions ; on an average of three consecutive 
years, ending 1804 inclusive, they were 68 millions , 
in 1806-7, they were 138 millions ; and in 1815, 133 
millions of dollars. The annual value of the imports. 



94 



WORKS OF THE REV. SIDNEY SMITH. 



on an average of three years ending 1804, was 75,000- 
000, of which the dominions of Great Britain furnished 
nearly one half. On an average of three years ending 
in 1804, America imported from Great Britain to the 
amount of about 30 millions, and returned goods to 
the amount of about 23 millions. Certainly these are 
countries that have some better employment for their 
time and energy than cutting each other's throats, 
nd may meet for more profitable purposes. — The 
American imports from the dominions of Great Britain, 
before the great American war, amounted to about 3 
millions sterling ; soon after the war, to the same. 
From 1805 to 1811, both inclusive, the average annual 
exportation of Great Britain to all parts of the world, 
in real value, was about 43 millions sterling, of which 
one fifth, or nearly 9 millions, was sent to America. 

Tonnage and Navigation. — Before the revolutionary 
war, the American tonnage, whether owned by British 
or American subjects, was about 127,000 tons ; im- 
mediately after that war, 108,000. In 1789, it had 
amounted to 437,733 tons, of which 279,000 was 
American property. In 1790, the total was 605,825, 
of which 354,000 was American. In 1816, the ton- 
nage, all American, was 1,300,000. On an aver- 
age of three years, from 1810 to 1812, both inclu- 
sive, the registered tonnage of the British empire 
was 2,459,000 ; or little more than double the American. 
Lands. — All public lands are surveyed before they 
are offered for sale ; and divided into townships of six 
miles square, which are subdivided into thirty-six sec- 
tions of one mile square, containing each 640 acres. 
The following lands are excepted from the sales. — 
One thirty-sixth part of the lands, or a section of 640 
acres in each township, is uniformly reserved for the 
support of schools ; seven entire townships, contain- 
ing each 23,000 acres, have been reserved in perpetuity 
for the support of learning : all salt springs and lead 
mines are also reserved. The Mississippi, the Ohio, 
and all the navigable rivers and waters leading into 
either, or into the river St. Lawrence, remain com- 
mon highways, and for ever free to all the citizens of 
the United States, without payment of any tax. All 
the other public lands, not thus excepted, are offered 
for public sale in quarter sections of 160 acres, at a 
price not less than two dollars per acre, and as much 
more as they will fetch by public auction. It was 
formerly the duty of the secretary of the treasury to 
superintend the sale of lands. In 1812, an office, de- 
nominated the General Land Office, was instituted. 
The public lands sold prior to the opening of the land- 
offices, amounted to one million and a half of acres. 
The aggregate of the sales since the opening of the 
land-offices, N. W. of the river Ohio, to the end of 
September, 1817, amounted to 8,469,644 acres ; and 
the purchase money to 18,000,000 dollars. The lands 
sold since the opening of the land-offices in the Mis- 
sissippi territory, amount to 1,600,000 acres. The 
stock of unsold land on hand is calculated at 400,000,- 
000 acres. In the year 1817, there were sold above 
two millions acres. 

Post Office. — In 1789, the number of post offices in 
the United States was seventy-five ; the amount of 
postage 38,000 dollars ; the miles of post-road 1800. 
In 1817, the number of post offices was 3,459 ; the 
amount of postage 961 ,000 dollars ; and the extent of 
post-roads 51,600 miles. 

Revenue. — The revenues of the United States are 
derived from the customs ; from duties on distilled 
spirits, carriages, snuff, refined sugar, auctions, 
stamped paper, goods, wares, and merchandise manu- 
factured within the United States, household furniture, 
gold and silver watches, and postage of letters ; from 
moneys arising from the sale of public lands, and from 
fees on letters patent. The following are the duties 
paid at the custom house for some of the principal 
articles of importation: — 7 1-2 per cent, on dyeing 
drugs, jewellery, and watchwork ; 15 per cent, on 
hempen cloth, and on all articles manufactured from 
iron, tin, brass, and lead — on buttons, buckles, china, 
earthenware, and glass, except window glass ; 25 per 
cent, on cotton and woollen goods, and cotton twist ; 
30 per cent, on carriages, leather, and leather manu- 
factures, &c. 



The average annual produce of the customs, between 
1801 and 1810, both inclusive, was about twelve mil- 
lions dollars. In the year 1814, the customs amounted 
only to four millions ; and in the year 1815, the first 
year after the war, rose to thirty-seven miUions. 
From 1789 to 1814, the customs have constituted 65 
per cent, of the American revenues ; loans 26 per 
cent. ; and all other branches 8 to 9 per cent. They 
collect their customs at about 4 per cent.; the English 
expense of collection is 61. 2s. 6d. per cent. 

The duty upon spirits is extremely trifling to the 
consumer — not a penny per gallon. The number of 
distilleries is about 15,000. The licences produce a 
very inconsiderable sum. The tax laid upon carriages 
in 1814, varied from fifty dollars to one dollar, accord- 
ing to the value of the machine. In the year 1801 
there were more than fifteen thousand carriages of dif- 
ferent descriptions paying duty. The furniture-tax 
seems to have been a very singular species of tax, laid 
on during the last war. It was an ad valorem duty 
upon all the furniture in any man's possession, the 
value of which exceeded 600 dollars. Furniture can- 
not be estimated without domiciliary visits, nor domi- 
ciliary visits allowed without tyranny and vexation. 
An information laid against a 'new arm-chair, or a 
clandestine sideboard — a search-warrant and a convic- 
tion consequent upon it — have much more the appear- 
ance of English than American liberty. The license 
for a watch, too, is purely English. A truly free Eng 
lishman walks out covered with licences. It is impos- 
sible to convict him. He hag paid a guinea for his 
powdered head — a guinea for the coat of arms upon 
his seals — a three guinea license for the gun he car- 
ries upon his shoulder to shoot game ; and is so forti- 
fied with permits and official sanctions, that the most 
eagle-eyed informer cannot obtain the most trifling ad- 
vantage over him. 

America has borrowed, betwern 1791 and 1815, one 
hundred and seven millions of dollars, of which forty- 
nine millions were borrowed in 1813 and 1814. The 
internal revenue in the year 1815 amounted to eight 
millions dollars ; the gross revenue of the same year, 
including the loan, to fifty-one millions dollars. 

Army. — During the late war with Great Britain, 
Congress authorized the raising of 62,000 men for the 
armies of the United States, — though the actual num- 
ber raised never amounted to half that force. In Feb- 
ruary, 1815, the army of the United States did not 
amount to more than 32,000 men ; in January, 1S14, to 
23,000.* The recruiting service, as may be easily 
conceived, where the wages of labour are so high, goes 
on very slowly in America. The military peace estab- 
lishment was fixed in 1815 at 10,000 men. The Amer- 
icans are fortunately exempt from the insanity of gar- 
risoning little rocks and islands all over the world ; 
nor would they lavish millions upon the ignoble end 
of the Spanish Peninsula — the most useless and ex- 
travagant possession with which any European power 
was ever afflicted. In 1812, any recruit honourably 
discharged from the service was allowed three 
months' pay, and 160 acres of land. In 1S14, every 
non-commissioned officer, musician, and private, who 
enlisted and was afterwards honourably discharged,was 
allowed, upon such discharge, 320 acres. The enlist- 
ment was for five years, or during the war. The wid- 
ow, child, or parent of any person enlisted, who was 
killed or died in the service of the United States, was 
entitled to receive the same bounty in land. 

Every free white male between eighteen and forty- 
five, is liable to be called out in the militia, which is 
stated, in official papers, to amount to 748,000 per- 
sons. 

Navy. — On the 8th of June, 1781, the Americans 
had only one vessel of war, the Alliance; and that was 
thought to be too expensive, it was sold ! The at- 
tacks of the Barbary powers first roused them to form 
a navy ; which, in 1 797, amounted to three frigates. 
In 1814, besides a great increase of frigates, four 
seventy-fours were ordered to be built. In 1816, in 
consequence of some brilliant actions of their frigates, 



* Peace with Great Britain was signed in December, 1814, 
at Ghent. 



AMERICA. 



95 



the naval service had become very popular through- 
out the United States. One million of dollars were 
appropriated annually, for eight years, to the gradual 
increase of the navy ; nine seventy-fours,* and twelve 
forty-four gun ships were ordered to be built. Vacant 
and unappropriated lands belonging to the United 
States, fit to produce oak and cedar, were to be select- 
ed tor the use of the navy. The peace establishment 
of the marine corps was increased, and six navy yards 
were established. We were surprised to find Dr. Sey- 
bert complaining of a want of ship timber in America. 
' Many persons (he says) believe that our stock of 
live oak is very considerable ; but upon good authority 
we have been told, in 1801, that supplies of live oak 
from Georgia will be obtained with great difficulty, 
and that the larger pieces are very scarce.' In treat- 
ing of naval affairs, Dr. Seybert, with a very different 
purpose in view, pays the following involuntary trib- 
ute to the activity and effect of our late naval warfare 
against tbe Americans. 

' For a long time the majority of the people of the United 
States was opposed to an extensive and permanent naval 
establishment; and the force authorised by the legislature, 
until very lately, was intended for temporary purposes. A 
navy was considered to be beyond the financial means of our 
country ; and it was supposed the people would not submit to 
be taxed for its support. Our brilliant success in the late war 
has changed the public sentiment on this subject ; many per- 
sons who formerly opposed the navy, now consider it an essen- 
tial means for our defence. The late transactions on the bor- 
ders of the Chesapeak bay, cannot be forgotten ; the extent of 
that immense estuary enabled the enemy to sail triumphant into 
the interior of the United States For hundreds of miles along 
the shores of that great bay, our people were insulted ; our 
towns ravaged and destroyed ; a considerable population was 
teased and irritated ; depredations were hourly committed by 
an enemy who could penetrate into the bosom of the country, 
without our being able to molest him whilst he kept on the 
water. By the time a sufficient force was collected, to check 
his operations in one situation, his ships had already trans- 
ported him to another, which was feeble, and offered a booty 
to him. An army could make no resistance to this mode of 
warfare ; the people were annoyed ; and they suffered in the 
field only to be satisfied of their inability to check those who 
had the dominion upon our waters. The inhabitants who were 
in the immediate vicinity, were not alone affected by the 
enemy; his operations extended their influence to our great 
towns on the Atlantic coast; domestic intercourse and inter- 
nal commerce were interrupted, whilst that with foreign 
nations was, in some instances entirely suspended. The 
treasury documents for 1814 exhibit the phenomenon of 
the state of Pennsylvania not being returned in the list 
of the exporting states. We were not only deprived of 
revenue, but our expenditures were very much augmented. 
It is probable the amount of the expenditures incurred on the 
borders of the Chesapeak, would have been adequate to pro- 
vide naval means for the defence of those waters : the people 
might then have remained at home, secure from depredation, 
in the pursuit of their tranquil occupations. The expenses of 
the government, as well as of individuals, were very much 
augmented for every species of transportation. Everything 
had to be conveyed by land carriage. Our communication 
with the ocean was cut off. One thousand dollars were paid 
for the transportation of each of the thirty-two pounder can- 
non from Washington city to Lake Ontario, for the public 
service. Our roads became almost impassable from the heavy 
loads which were carried over them. These facts should in- 
duce us, in times of tranquillity, to provide for the national 
defence, and execute suce internal improvements as cannot be 
effected during the agitations of war.' — (p. 679.) 

Expenditure. — The President of the United States 
receives about 6000Z. a year ; the Vice President about 
600Z.; the deputies to Congress have 8 dollars per day, 
and 8 dollars for every 20 miles of journey. The first 
clerk of the House of Representatives receives about 
750Z. per annum ; the Secretary of State, 1200Z. ; the 
Postmaster-General, 750Z. ; the Chief Justice of the 
United States, 1000Z. ; a Minister Plenipotentiary, 
2200Z. per annum. There are, doubtless, reasons why 
there should be two noblemen appointed in this coun- 
try as Postmasters-General, with enormous salaries, 
neither of whom know a twopenny post letter from a 
general one, and where further retrenchments are sta- 
ted to be impossible. This is clearly a case to which 
that impossibility extends. But these are matters 



* The American seventy-four gun ships are as big as our 
first-rates, and their frigates nearly as big as ships of the line. 



where a prostration of understanding is called for; and 
good subjects are not to reason, but to pay. If, how- 
ever, we were ever to indulge in the Saxon practice of 
looking into our own affairs, some important docu- 
ments might be derived from these American salaries. 
Jonathan, for instance, sees no reason why the first 
clerk of his House of Commons should derive emolu- 
ments from his situation to the amount of 6000Z. or 
7000Z. per annum ; but Jonathan is vulgar and arith- 
metical. The total expenditure of the United States 
varied, between 1799 and 1811, both inclusive, from 1J 
to 17 million dollars. From 1812 to 1814, both inclu 
sive, and all these years of war with this country, the 
expenditure was consecutively 22, 29, and 38 millions 
dollars. The total expenditure of the United States, 
for 14 years, from 1791 to 1814, was 333 millions dol- 
lars ; of which, in the three last years of war with this 
country, from 1812 to 1814, there were expended 100 
millions of dollars, of which only 35 were supplied by 
revenue, the rest by loans and government paper. The 
sum total received by the American treasury from the 
3d of March, 1789, to the 31st of March, 1816, is 354 
millions dollars; of which 107 millions have been 
raised by loan, and 222 millions by the customs and 
tonnage : so that, exclusive of the revenue derived 
from loans, 222 parts out of 247 of the American rev- 
enue have been derived from foreign commerce. In 
the mind of any sensible American, this consideration 
ought to prevail over the few splendid actions of their 
half dozen frigates, which must, in a continued war, 
have been, with all their bravery and activity, swept 
from the face of the ocean by the superior force and 
equal bravery of the English. It would be the height 
of madness in America to run into another naval war 
with this country, if it could be averted by any other 
means than a sacrifice of proper dignity and charac- 
ter. They have, comparatively, no land revenue ; and 
in spite of the Franklin and Guerriere, though lined 
with cedar and mounted with brass cannon, they must 
soon be reduced to the same state which has been de- 
scribed by Dr. Seybert, and from which they were so 
opportunely extricated by the treaty of Ghent. David 
Porter and Stephen Decatur are very brave men ; but 
they will prove an unspeakable misfortune to their 
country, if they inflame Jonathan into a love of naval 
glory, and inspire him with any other love of war than 
that which is founded upon a determination not to sub- 
mit to serious insult and injury. 

We can inform Jonathan what are the inevitable con- 
sequences of being too fond of glory ; — Taxes upon 
every article which enters into the mouth, or covers the 
back, or is placed under the foot — taxes upon every thing 
which it is pleasant to see, hear, feel, smell, or taste — 
taxes upon warmth, light, and locomotion — taxes on 
every thing on earth, and the waters under the earth — 
on every thing that comes from abroad, or is grown at 
home — taxes on the raw material — taxes on every fresh 
value that is added to it by the industry of man — taxes 
on the sauce which pampers man's appetite, and the drug 
that restores him to health — on the ermine which deco- 
rates the judge, and the rope which hangs the criminal 
— on the poor man's salt, and the rich man's spice — on 
the brass nails of the coffin, and the ribands of the bride 
— at bed or board, couchant or levant, we must pay. — 
The schoolboy whips his taxed top — the beardless youth 
manages his taxed horse, with a taxed bridle, on a taxed 
road : — and the dying Englishman, pouring his medicine, 
which has paid Iper cent., into a spoon that has paid lb 
per cent., flings himself back upon his chintz bed, which 
has paid 22 per cent., — and expires in the arms of an 
apothecary who has paid a license of a hundred pounds 
for the privilege of putting him to death. His whole 
property is then immediately taxed from 2 to 10 per cent. 
Besides the probate, large fees are demanded for burying 
him in the chancel ; his virtues are handed down to pos- 
terity on taxed marble ; and he is then gathered to his 
fathers,— to be taxed no more. In addition to all this, 
the habit of dealing with large sums will make the 
government avaricious and profuse ; and the system 
itself will infallibly generate the base vermin of spies 
and informers, and a still more pestilent race of poli- 
tical tools and retainers of the meanest and most 
odious description ;— while the prodigious patronage 



96 



WORKS OF THE REV. SIDNEY SMITH. 



which the collecting of this splendid revenue will i the four quarters of the globe, who reads an American 
throw into the hands of government, will invest it book? or goes to an American play? or looks at an 
with so vast an influence, and hold out such means | American picture or statue ? What does the world 
and temptations to corruption, as all the virtue and yet owe to American physicians or surgeons? What 
public spirit, even of republicans, will be unable to new substances have their chemists discovered? or 



resist. 

Every wise Jonathan should remember this, when 
he sees the rabble huzzaing at the heels of the truly 
respectable Decatur, or inflaming the vanity of that 
still more popular leader, whose justification has 
lowered the character of his government with all the 
civilized nations of the world. 

Debt. — America owed 42 millions dollars after the Re- 
volutionary war ; in 1790, 79 millions ; in 1803,70 mil- 
lions ; and in the beginning of January, 1812, the public 
debt was diminished to 45 millions dollars. After the 
last war with England, it had risen to 123 millions ; and 
so it stood on the 1st of January, 1816. The total 
amount carried to the credit of the commissioners of 
the sinking fund, on the 31st of December, 1816, was 
about 34 millions of dollars. 

Such is the land of Jonathan — and thus has it been 
governed. In his honest endeavours to better his situ- 
ation, and in his manly purpose of resisting injury and 
insult, we most cordially sympathize. We hope he 
will always continue to watch and suspect his govern- 
ment as he now does — remembering, that it Ls the 
constant tendency of those entrusted with power, to 
conceive that they enjoy it by their own merits, and 
for their own use, and not by delegation, and for the 
benefit of others. Thus far we are the friends and 
admirers of Jonathan. But he must not grow vain 
and ambitious ; or allow himself to be dazzled by that 
galaxy of epithets by which his orators and news- 
paper scribblers endeavour to persuade their sup- 
porters that they are the greatest, the most refined, 
the most enlightened, and most moral people upon 
earth. The effect of this is unspeakably ludicrous on 
this side of the Atlantic — and, even on the other, we 
shall imagine, must be rather humiliating to the rea- 
sonable part of the population. The Americans are a 
brave, industrious, and acute people ; but they have 
hitherto given no indications of genius, and made no 
approaches to the heroic, either in their morality or 
character. They are but a recent offset indeed from 
England ; and should make it their chief boast, for 
many generations to come, that they are sprung from 
the same race with Bacon and Shakspeare and New- 
ton. Considering their numbers, indeed, and the 
favourable circumstances in which they have been 
placed, they have yet done marvellously little to assert 
the honour of such a descent, or to show that their 
English blood has been exalted or refined by their re- 
publican training and institutions. Their Franklins 
and Washingtons, and all the other sages and heroes 
of their Revolution, were born and bred subjects of 
the King of England, — and not among the freest or 
most valued of his subjects. And since the period of 
their separation, ft far greater proportion of their 
statesmen and artists and political writers have been 
foreigners, than ever occurred before in the history of 
any civilized and educated people. During the thirty 
or forty years of their independence, they have done 
absolutely nothing for the Sciences, for the Arts, for 
Literature, or even for the statesman-like studies 
of Politics or Political Economy. Confining our 
selves to our own country, and to the period that has 
elapsed since they had an independent existence, 
we would ask, Where are their Foxes, their Burkes, 
their Sheridans, their Windhams, their Homers, 
their Wilberforces ? — where their Arkwrights, their 
Watts, their Davys? — their Robertsons, Blairs, 
Smiths, Stewarts, Paleys, and Malthuses ? — their 
Porsons, Parrs, Burneys, or Bloomfields ?— their Scotts, 
Rogers's, Campbells, Byrons, Moores, or Crabbes ? — 
their Siddons's, Kembles, Keans, or O'Neils !— their 
Wilkes, Lawrences, Chantrys? — or their parallels to 
the hundred other names that have spread themselves 
over the world from our little island in the course of 
the last thirty years, and blest or delighted mankind 
by their works, inventions, or examples ? In so far 
as we know, there is no such parallel to be produced 
lrom the whole annals of this self-adulating race. In 



what old ones have they analyzed? What new con- 
stellations have been discovered by the telescopes of 
Americans ? What have they done in mathematics ? 
Who drinks out of American glasses ? or eats from 
American plates ? or wears American coats or gowns ? 
or sleeps in American blankets ? Finally, under which 
of the old tyrannical governments of Europe is every 
sixth man a slave, whom his fellow-creatures may 
buy and sell and torture ? 

When these questions are fairly and favourably an- 
swered, their laudatory epithets may be aUowed : but 
till that can be done, we would seriously advise them 
to keep clear of superlatives. 



IRELAND. (Edinburgh Review, 1820.) 



Whitelaw's History of the City of Dublin, tto. 

and Davies. 



Cadell 



2. Observations on the State of Ireland, principally directed to 
its Agriculture and Rural Population ; in a Series of Let- 
ters written on a Tour through that Country. In 2 vols. 
By J. C. Curwen, Esq., M. P. London, 13 IS. 

3. Gamble's Views of Society in Ireland. 

These are all the late publications that treat of 
Irish interests in general, — and none of them are of 
first-rate importance. Mr. Gamble's travels in Ireland 
are of a very ordinary description — low scenes and 
low humour making up the principal part of the nar- 
rative. There are readers, however, whom it will 
amuse ; and the reading market becomes more and 
more extensive, and embraces a greater variety of 
persons every day. Mr. Whitelaw's History of Dub- 
lin is a book of great accuracy and research, highly 
creditable to the industry, good sense, and benevo- 
lence of its author. Of the travels of Mr. Christian 
Curwen, we hardly know what to say. He is bold and 
honest in his politics — a great enemy to abuses — va- 
pid in his levity and pleasantry, and infinitely too much 
inclined to declaim upon commonplace topics of mor- 
ality and benevolence. But, with these draw-backs, 
the book is not ill written; and may be advantageous- 
ly read by those who are desirous of information upon 
the present state of Ireland. 

So great, and so long has been the misgovernment 
of that country, that we verily believe the empire 
would be much stronger, if every thing was open sea 
between England and the Atlantic, and if skates and 
codfish swam over the fair land of Ulster. Such job- 
bing, such profligacy — so much direct tyranny and op- 
pression — such an abuse of God's gifts — such a pro- 
fanation of God's name for the purposes of bigotry 
and party spirit, cannot be exceeded in the history of 
civilized Europe, and will long remain a monument of 
infamy and shame to England. But it will be more 
useful to suppress the indignation which the very 
name of Ireland inspires, and to consider impartially 
those causes which have marred this fair portion of 
the creation, and kept it wild and savage in the midst 
of improving Europe. 

The great misfortune of Ireland is, that the mass of 
the people have been given up for a century to a hand- 
ful of Protestants, by whom they have been treated as 
Helots, and subjected to every species of persecution 
and disgrace. The sufferings of the Catholics have 
been so loudly chanted in the very streets, that it is 
almost needless to remind our readers that, during the 
reigns of George I. and George the II., the Irish Ro- 
man Catholics were disabled from holding any civil or 
military office, from voting at elections, from admis- 
sion into corporations, from practising law or physic. 
A younger brother, by turning Protestant, might de- 
prive his elder brother of his birth-right : by the same 
process, he might force his father, under the name of 
a liberal provision, to yield up to him a part of his 
landed property; and, if an eldest son, he might, in 
the same way, reduce his father's fee-simple to a life 
estate. A Papist was disabled, from purchasing free- 



IRELAND. 



97 



hold lands — and even from holding long leases — and 
any person might take his Catholic neighbour's house 
by paying £5 for it. If the child of a Catholic father 
turned Protestant, he was taken away from his father 
and put into the hands of a Protestant relation. No 
Papist could purchase a free-hold, or lease for more 
than thirty years — or inherit from an intestate Protes- 
tant — nor from an intestate Catholic — nor dwell in Li- 
merick or Galway — nor hold an advowson, nor buy an 
annuity for life. j£50 was given for discovering a po- 
pish archbfshop — £30 for a popish clergyman — and 
10$. for a schoohnaster. No one was allowed to be 
trustee for Catholics ; no Catholic was allowed to take 
more than two apprentices ; no Papist to be solicitor, 
sheriff, or to serve on grand juries. Horses of Papists 
might be seized for the militia ; for which militia Pa- 
pists were to pay double, and to find Protestant sub- 
stitutes. Papists were prohibited from being high or 
petty constables ; and, when resident in towns, they 
were compelled to find Protestant watchmen. Barris- 
ters and solicitors marrying Catholics, were exposed 
to the penalties of Catholics. Persons plundered by 
privateers during a war with any Popish prince, were 
reimbursed by a levy on the Catholic inhabitants 
where they lived. All popish priests celebrating mar- 
riages contrary to 12 Geo. 1. cap. 3, were to be hanged. 

The greater part of these incapacities are removed, 
•hough many of a very serious and oppressive nature 
still remain. But the grand misfortune is, that the 
spirit which these oppressive laws engendered still 
remains. The Protestant still looks upon the Catho- 
lic as a degraded being. The Catholic does not yet 
consider himself upon an equality with his former 
tyrant and taskmaster. That religious hatred which 
-equired all the prohibiting vigilance of the law for its 
"estraint, has* found in the law its strongest support ; 
and the spirit which the law first exasperated and 
embittered, continues to act long after the original 
stimulus is withdrawn. The law which prevented 
Catholics from serving on grand juries is repealed ; but 
Catholics are not called upon grand juries in the pro- 
portion in which they are entitled, by their rank and 
fortune. The Duke of Bedford did all he could to give 
them the benefit of those laws which are already pas- 
sed in their favour. But power is seldom entrusted in 
this country to one of the Duke of Bedford's liberality ; 
and every thing has fallen back in the hands of his 
successors into the ancient division of the privileged 
and degraded castes. We do' not mean to cast any 
reflection upon the present Secretary for Ireland, whom 
we believe to be on this subject a very liberal politi- 
cian, and on all subjects an honourable and excellent 
man. The government under which he serves allows 
him to indulge in a little harmless liberality ; but it is 
perfectly understood that nothing is intended to be 
done for the Catholics ; that no loaves and fishes will 
be lost by indulgence in Protestant insolence and tyran- 
ny ; and therefore, among the generality of Irish Pro- 
testants, insolence, tyranny, and exclusion continue to 
operate. However eligible the Catholic may be, he is 
not elected ; whatever barriers may be thrown down, 
he does not advance a step. He was first kept out by 
law ; he is now kept out by opinion and habit. They 
have been so long in chains, that nobody believes them 
capable of using their hands and feet. 

It is not however the only or worst misfortune of 
the Catholics, that the relaxations of the law are hith- 
erto of little benefit to them; the law is not yet suffi- 
ciently relaxed. A Catholic, as every body knows, 
cannot be made sheriff; cannot be in Parliament ; can- 
not be a director o*f the Irish Bank ; cannot fill the 
great departments of the law, the army, and the navy ; 
is cut off from all the objects of human ambition, and 
treated as a marked and degraded person. 

The common admission now is, that the Catholics 
are to the Protestants in Ireland as about 4 to 1 — of 
which Protestants, not more than one half belong to 
the Church of Ireland. This, then, is one of the most 
striking features in the state of Ireland. That the 
great mass of the population is completely subjugated 
and overawed by a handful of comparatively recent 
settlers,— in whom all the power and patronage of the 
country is vested,— who have been reluctantly com- 



pelled to desist from still greater abuses of a lUority, 
—and who look with trembling apprehension to the 
increasing liberality of the Parliament and the country 
towards these unfortunate persons whom they have 
always looked upon as their property and their prey. 
Whatever evils may result from these proportions 
between the oppressor and the oppressed — to whatever 
dangers a country so situated may be considered to be 
exposed — these evils and dangers are rapidly increa- 
sing in Ireland. The proportion of Catholics to Pro- 
testants is infinitely greater now than it was thirty 
years ago, and is becoming more and more favourable 
to the former. By a return made to the Irish House 
of Lords in 1732, the proportion of Catholics to Pro- 
testants was not 2 to 1. li is now (as we have already 
observed) 4 to 1 ; and the causes which have thus alter- 
ed the proportion in favour of the Catholics, are suffi- 
ciently obvious to any one acquainted with the state 
of Ireland. The B,oman Catholic priest resides ; his 
income entirely depends upon the number of his flock ; 
and he must exert himself, or he starves. There is 
some chance of success, therefore, in his efforts to 
convert; but the Protestant clergyman, if he were 
equally eager, has little or no probability of persuading 
so much larger a proportion of the population to come 
over to his church. The Catholic clergyman belongs 
to a religion that has always been more desirous of 
gaining proselytes than the Protestant church ; and he 
is animated by a sense of injury and a desire of re> 
venge. Another reason for the disproportionate in- 
crease of Catholics is, that the Catholics will marry 
upon means which the Protestant considers as insuffi- 
cient for marriage. A few potatoes and a shed of turf, 
are all that Luther has left for the Romanist ; and, 
when, the latter gets these, he instantly begins upon 
the great Irish manufacture of children. But a Pro- 
testant belongs to the sect that eats the fine flour, and 
leaves the bran to others ; he must have comforts, and 
he does not marry till he gets them.' He would be 
ashamed, if he were seen living as a Catholic lives. 
This is the principal reason why the Protestants who 
remain attached to their church do not increase so fast 
as the Catholics. But in common minds, daily scenes, 
the example of the majority, the power of imitation, 
decide their habits, religious as well as civil. A Pro- 
testant labourer who works among Catholics, soon 
learns to think and act and talk as they do — he is not 
proof against the eternal panegyric which he hears of 
Father O'Leary. His Protestantism is rubbed away , 
and he goes at last, after some little resistance, to the 
chapel, where he sees every body else going. 

These eight Catholics not only hate the ninth man, 
the Protestant of the Establishment, for the unjust 
privileges he enjoys— not only remember that the lands 
of their father were given to his father — but they find 
themselves forced to pay for the support of his religion. 
In the wretched state of poverty in which the lower 
orders of Irish are plunged, it is not without considera- 
ble effort they can pay the few shillings necessary for 
the support of their Catholic priest ; and when this is 
effected, a tenth of the potatoes in the garden are to 
be set out for the support of a persuasion, the intro- 
duction of which into Ireland they consider as the great 
cause of their political inferiority, and all their mani- 
fold wretchedness. In England, a labourer can procure 
constant employment — or he can, at the worst, obtain 
relief from his parish. Whether tithe operates as a 
tax upon him, is known only to the political economist : 
if he does pay it, he does not know that he pays it; 
and the burthen of supporting the clergy is at least kept 
out of his view. But in Ireland, the only method in 
which a poor man lives, is by taking a small portion 
of land, in which he can grow potatoes : seven or eight 
months out of the twelve, in many parts of Ireland, 
there is no constant employment of the poor: and the 
potato farm is all that shelters them from absolute fa- 
mine. If the pope were to come in person, and seize 
upon every tenth potato, the poor peasant would 
scarcely endure it. With what patience, then, can he 
see it tossed into the cart of the heretic Rector, who 
has a church without a congregation, and a revenue 
without duties ? 
We do not say whether these things axe right or 



WORKS OF THE REV. SIDNEY SMITH. 



wrong — whether they want a remedy at all — or what 
remedy they want ; but we paint them in those colours 
in which they appear to the eye of poverty and igno-' 
ranee, without saying whether those colours are false 
or true. Nor is the case at all comparable to that of 
Dissenters paying tithe in England ; which case is pre- 
cisely the reverse of what happens in Ireland, for it is 
the contribution of a very small minority to the reli- 
gion of a very large majority; and the numbers on 
either side make all the difference in the argument. — 
To exasperate the poor Catholic still more, the rich 
graziers of the parish — or the squire in his parish — pay 
no tithe at ill for their grass land. Agistment tithe is 
abolished in Ireland ; and the burthen of supporting 
two churches seems to devolve upon the poorer Cath- 
olics, struggling with plough and spade in small scraps 
of dearly-rented land. Tithes seem to be collected in 
a more harsh manner than they are collected in Eng- 
land. The minute subdivisions of land in Ireland — 
the little connection which the Protestant clergyman 
commonly has with the Catholic population of his 
parish, have made the introduction of tithe proctors 
very general — sometimes as the agent of the clergy- 
man — sometimes as the lessee or middleman between 
the clergyman and the cultivator of the land ; but, in 
either case, practised, dexterous estimators of tithe. 
The English clergymen, in general, are far from ex- 
acting the whole of what is due to them, but sacrifice 
a little to the love of popularity, or to the dread of 
odium. A system of tithe-proctors established all 
over England (as it is in Ireland,) would produce gen- 
eral disgust and alienation from the Established 
Church. 

'During the administration of Lord Halifax,' says Mr. 
Hardy, in quoting the opinion of Lord Charlemont upon 
tithes paid by Catholics, ' Ireland was dangerously disturbed 
in its southern and northern regions. In the south princi- 
pally, in the counties of Kilkenny, Limerick, Cork, and 
Tipperary, the White Boys now made their first appear- 
ance ; those White Boys, who have ever since occasionally 
disturbed the public tranquillity, without any rational meth- 
od having been as yet pursued to eradicate this disgraceful 
evil. When we consider, that the very same district has 
been for the long space of seven-and-twenty years liable to 
frequent returns of the same disorder into which it has con- 
tinually relapsed, in spite of all the violent remedies from 
time to time administered by our political quacks, we can- 
not doubt but that some real, peculiar, and topical cause 
must exist ; and yet, neither the removal, nor even the in- 
vestigation of this cause, has ever once been seriously at- 
tempted. Laws of the most sanguinary and unconstitution- 
al nature have been enacted ; the country has been dis- 
graced, and exasperated by frequent and bloody executions; 
and the gibbet, that perpetual resource of weak and cruel 
legislators, has groaned under the multitude of starving 
criminals ; yet, while the cause is suffered to exist, the ef- 
fects will ever follow. The amputation of limbs will never 
eradicate a prurient humour, which must be sought in its 
source, and there remedied.' 

« I wish,' continues Mr. Wakefield, < for the sake of hu- 
manity, and for the honour of the Irish character, that the 
gentlemen of that country would take this matter into their 
serious consideration. Let them only for a moment place 
themselves in the situation of the half-famished cotter, sur- 
rounded by a wretched family, clamorous for food ; and 
judge what his feelings must be, when he sees the tenth part 
of the produce of his potatoe garden exposed at harvest 
time to public cant ; or, if he have given a promissary note 
for the payment of a certain sum of money, to compensate 
for such tithe when it becomes due, to hear the heart-rend- 
ing cries of his offspring clinging around him, and lament- 
ing for the milk of which they are deprived, by the cows 
Deing driven to the pound, to be sold to discharge the debt. 
Such accounts are not the creation of fancy; the facts do 
exist, and are but too common in Ireland. Were one of 
them transferred to canvass by the hand of genius, and ex- 
hibited to English humanity, that heart must be callous in- 
deed that could refuse its sympathy. I have seen the cow, 
the favourite cow, driven away, accompanied by the sighs, 
the tears, and the imprecations of a whole family, who 
were paddling after, through wet and dirt, to take their last 
affectionate farewell of this their only friend and benefac- 
tor, at the pound gate. I have heard with emotions which 
I can scarcely describe, deep curses repeated from village to 
village as the cavalcade proceeded. I have witnessed the 
gTOup pass the domain walls of the opulent grazier, whose 
herds were cropping the most luxuriant pastures, while he 
was secure from any demand for the tithe of their food, 
looking on with the most unfeeling indifference.'— Wake- 
field, p. 486. 



In Munster, where tithe 01 p rt « oes is exacted, 
risings against the system have constantly occurred 
during the last forty years. In Ulster, where no such 
; tithe is required, these insurrections are unknown. — 
, The double church which Ireland supports, and that 
| painful visible contribution towards it which the poor 
j Irishman is compelled to make from his miserable pit- 
j tance, is one great cause of those never ending insur- 
rections, burnings, murders, and robberies, which 
I have laid waste that ill-fated country for so many 
! years. The unfortunate consequence of the civil disa- 
i bilities, and the church payments under which the 
J Catholics labor, is a'rooted antipathy to this country. 
They hate the English government from historical 
recollection, actual suffering, and disappointed hope ; 
and till they are better treated, they will continue to 
hate it. At this moment, in a period of the most pro- 
found peace, there are twenty-five thousand of the best 
disciplined and best appointed troops in the world in 
Ireland, with bayonets fixed, presented arms, and in 
the attitude of present war : nor is there a man too 
much — nor would Ireland be tenable without them. — 
When it was necessary last year (or thought neces- 
sary) to put down the children of reform, we were 
forced to make a new levy of troops in this country — 
not a man could be spared from Ireland. The mo. 
ment they had embarked, Peep-of-day Boys, Heart-of- 
Oak Boys, Twelve-o'clock Boys, He art- of- flint Boys 
and all the bloody boyhood of the Bog of Allen 
would have proceeded to the ancient work of riot, ra- 
pine, and disaffection. Ireland, in short, till her 
wrongs are redressed, and a more liberal policy is 
adopted towards her, will always be a cause of anxiety 
and suspicion to this country ; and, in some moment 
of our weakness and depression, will forcibly extor* 
what she would now receive with gratit»de and exul 
tation. 

Ireland is situated close to another island of greater 
size, speaking the same language, very superior in 
civilization, and the seat of government. The conse- 
quence of this is the emigration of the richest and 
most powerful part of the community — a vast drain of 
wealth — and the absence of all that wholesome influ- 
ence which the representatives of ancient families 
residing upon their estates, produce upon their tenant- 
ry and dependants. Can any man imagine that the 
scenes which have been acted in Ireland within these 
last twenty years, would have taken place, if such vast 
proprietors as the Duke of Devonshire, the Marquis of 
Hertford, the Marquis of Lansdown, Earl Fitzwilliam, 
and many other men of equal wealth, had been in the 
constant habit of residing upon their Irish, as they are 
upon their English estates ? Is it of no consequence to 
the order, and the civilization of a large district, 
whether the great mansion is inhabited by an insigni- 
ficant, perhaps a mischievous, attorney, in the shape 
of agent, or whether the first and greatest men of the 
United Kingdoms, after the business of Parliament is 
over, come with their friends and families, to exercise 
hospitality, to spend large revenues, to diffuse infor- 
mation, and to improve manners ? This evil is a very 
serious one to Ireland ; and, as far as we see, incura- 
ble. For if the present large estates were, by the 
dilapidation of families, to be broken to pieces and 
sold, others equally great would, in the free circula- 
tion of property, speedily accumulate ; and the mo- 
ment any possessor arrived at a certain pitch of for- 
tune, he would probably choose to reside in the better 
country, near the Parliament or the court. 

This absence of great proprietors in Ireland neces- 
sarily brings with it, or if not necessarily, has actually 
brought with it, the employment of middlemen, which 
forms one other standing and regular Irish grievance. 
We are well aware of all that can be said in defence 
of middlemen ; that they stand between the little 
farmer and the great proprietor, as the shopkeeper 
does between the manufacturer and consumer ; and, in 
fact, by their intervention, save time, and therefore 
exj f»nse. This maybe true enough in the abstract ; 
but tl e particular nature of land must be attended to 
The object of the man who makes cloth is to sell his 
cloth at the present market, for as high a price as he 
can obtain. If that price is too high, it soon falls ;- 



IRELAND. 



9^ 



but no injury is done to his machinery by the superior 
price he has enjoyed for a season — he is just as able 
to produce cloth with it, as if the profits he enjoyed 
had always been equally moderate ; he has no fear, — 
therefore, of the middleman, or of any species of moral 
machinery which may help to obtain for him the 
greatest present prices. The same would be the feel- 
ing of any one who let out a steam engine, or any other 
machine, for the purposes of manufacture ; he would 
naturally take the highest price he could get : for he 
might either let his machine for a price proportionate 
to the work it did, or the repairs, estimable with the 
greatest precision, might be thrown upon the tenant ; 
in short, he could hardly ask any rent too high for his 
machine which a responsible person would give ; — 
dilapidation would be so visible, and so calculable in 
such instances, that any secondary lease, or subletting, 
would be rather an increase of security than a source 
of alarm. Any evil from such a practice would be 
improbable, measurable, and remediable. In land, on 
the contrary, the object is not to get the highest prices 
absolutely, but to get the highest prices which will 
not injure the machine. One tenant may offer and 

{>ay double the rent of another, and in a few years 
eave the land in a state which will effectually bar all 
future offers of tenancy. It is of no use to fill a lease 
full of clauses and covenants ; a tenant who pays more 
than he ought to pay, or who pays even to the last 
farthing which he ought to pay, will rob the land, and 
injure the machine, in spite of all the attorneys in 
England. He will rob it even if he means to remain 
upon it — driven on by present distress, and anxious to 
put off the day of defalcation and arrear. The dam- 
age is often difficult of detection, not easily calculated, 
not easily to be proved ; such for which juries (them- 
selves perhaps farmers) will not willingly give suffi- 
cient compensations And if this is true in England, it 
is much more strikingly true in Ireland, where it is 
extremely difficult to obtain verdicts for breaches of 
covenant in leases. 

The only method then of guarding the machine 
from real injury is, by giving to the actual occupier 
such advantage in his contract, that he is unwilling to 
give it up — that he has a real interest in retaining it, 
and is not driven by the distresses of the present mo- 
ment to destroy the future productiveness of the soil. 
Any rent which the landlord accepts more than this, 
or any system by which more, rent than this is obtain- 
ed, is to borrow money upon the most usurious and 
profligate interest— to increase the revenue of the pre- 
sent day by the absolute ruin of the property. Such 
is the effect produced by a middleman : he gives high 
prices that he may obtain higher from the occupier ; 
more is paid by the actual occupier than is consistent 
with the safety and preservation of the machine ; the 
land is run out, and, in the end, that maximum of rent 
we have described is not obtained ; and not only is 
the property injured by such a system, but in Ireland 
the most shocking consequences ensue from it. There 
is little manufacture in Ireland ; the price of labour is 
low, the demand for labour irregular. If a poor man 
is driven, by distress of rent, from his potato garden, 
he has no other resource— all is lost : he will do the 
impossible (as the French say) to retain it ; and sub- 
scribe any bond, and promise any rent. The middle- 
man has no character to lose ; and he knew, when he 
took up the occupation, that it was one with which 
pity had nothing to do. On he drives ; and backward 
the poor peasant recedes, losing something at every 
step, till he comes to the very brink of despair ; and 
then he recoils and murders his oppressor, and is a 
White Boy or a Right Boy;— the soldier shoots him, 
and the judge hangs him. m _ 

In the debate which took place in the Irish House 
of Commons, upon the bill for preventing tumultuous 
risings and assemblies, on the 31st of January, 1787, 
the Attorney-General submitted to the House the fol- 
lowing narrative of facts. 

«The commencement,' said he, 'was in one or two pa- 
rishes in the county of Kerry; and they proceeded thus. 
The people assembled in a Catholic chapel, and there took 
an oatb to obey the laws of Captain Right, and to starve 



the clergy. They then proceeded to the next parishes, on 
the following Sunday, and there swore the people in the 
same manner; with this addition, that they (the people last 
sworn) should on the ensuing Sunday proceed to the chapels 
of their next neighbouring parishes, and swear the inhabi- 
tants of those parishes in like manner. Proceeding in this 
manner, they very soon went through the province of Mun- 
ster. The first object was, the reformation of tithes. They 
swore not to give more than a certain price per acre; not to 
assist, or to allow them to be assisted, in drawing the tithe, 
and to permit no proctor. They next took upon them to 
prevent the collection of parish cesses; next to nominate 
parish clerks, and in some cases curates : to say what church 
should or should not be repaired ; and in one case to threaten 
that they would burn a new church, if the old one were not 
given for a mass-house. At last they proceeded to regulate 
the price of lands; to raise the price of labour; and to 
oppose the collection of the hearth money, and other taxes. 
Bodies cf 5000 of them have been seen 'to march through 
the country unarmed, and if met by any magistrate, they 
never offered the smallest rudeness or offence; on the con- 
trary, they had allowed persons charged with crimes to be 
taken from amongst them by the magistrate alone, unaided 
by any force.' 

' The Attorney-General said he was well acquainted with 
the province of Munster, and that it was impossible for 
human wretchedness to exceed that of the peasantry of that 
province. The unhappy tenantry were ground to powder by 
relentless landlords; that, far from being able to give the 
clergy their just dues, they had not food or raiment for 
themselves — the landlord grasped the whole; and sorry was 
he to add, that, not satisfied with the present extortion, some 
landlords had been so base as to instigate the insurgents to 
rob the clergy of their tithes, not in order to alleviate the 
distresses of the tenantry, but that they might add the 
clergy's share to the cruel rack-rents they already paid. 
The poor people of Munster lived in a more abject state of 
poverty than human nature could be supposed equal to bear.' — 
Grattan's Speeches, vol. i. 292. 



We are not, of course, in such a discussion, to be 
governed by names. A middleman might be tied up, 
by the strongest legal restriction, as to the price he 
was to exact from the under-tenants, and then he 
would be no more pernicious to the estate than a 
steward. A steward might be protected in exactions 
as severe as the most rapacious middleman ; and then, 
of course, it would be the same thing under another 
name. The practice to which we object is, the too 
common method in Ireland of extorting the last far- 
thing which the tenant is willing to give for land, ra- 
ther than quit it : and the machinery by which such 
practice is carried into effect, is that of the middle- 
man. It is not only that it ruins the land ; it ruins the 
people also. They are made so poor — brought so 
near the ground — that they can sink no lower : and 
burst out at last into all the acts of desperation and 
revenge, for which Ireland is so notorious. Men who 
have money in their pockets and find that they are 
improving in their circumstances, don't do these 
things. Opulence, or the hope of opulence or com- 
fort, is the parent of decency, order, and submission 
to the laws. A landlord in Ireland understands the 
luxury of carriages and horses ; but has no Telish for 
the greater luxury of surrounding himself with a mor- 
al and grateful tenantry. The absent proprietor looks 
only to revenue, and cares nothing for the disorder 
and degradation of a country which he never means 
to visit. There are very honourable exceptions to 
this charge : but there are too many living instances 
that it is just. The rapacity of the Irish landlord in- 
duces him to allow of" the extreme division of his 
lands. When the daughter marries, a little portion of 
the little farm is broken off— another corner for Pat- 
rick, and another for Dermot — till the land is broken 
into sections, upon one of which an English cow could 
not stand. Twenty mansions of misery are thus rear- 
ed instead of one. A louder cry of oppression is lift- 
ed up to heaven; and fresh enemies to the English 
name and power are multiplied on the earth. The 
Irish gentlemen, too, extremely desirous of paJitical 
influence, multiply freeholds, and split votes; and 
this propensity tends of course to increase the miser- 
able redundance of living beings, under which Ireland 
is groaning. Among the manifold wretchedness to 
which the poor Irish tenant is liable, we must not pass 
over the practice of driving for rent. A lets land to 
B, who lets it to C, who lets it again to D. D pays C 



100 



WORKS OF THE REV SIDNEY SMITH. 



his rent, and C pays B. But if B fails to pay A, the I 
cattle of B, C, D are all driven to the pound, and, af- 
ter the interval of a few days, sold by auction. A | 
general driving of this kind very frequently leads to a 
bloody insurrection. It may be ranked among the 
classical grievances of Ireland. 

Potatoes enter for a great deal into the present con- 
dition of Ireland. They are much cheaper than 
wheat ; and it is so easy to rear a family upon them, 
that there is no check to population from the difficul- 
ty of procuring food. The population therefore goes 
oh with a rapidity approaching almost to that of new 
countries, and in a much greater ratio than the im- 
proving agriculture and manufactures of the country 
can find employment for it. All degrees of all nations 
begin with living in pig-styes. The king or the priest 
first gets out of them ; then the noble, then the pau- 
per, in proportion as each class becomes more and 
more opulent. Better tastes arise from better cicum- 
stances : and the luxury of one period is the wretch- 
edness and poverty of another. English peasants, in 
the time of Henry the Seventh, were lodged as badly 
as Irish peasants now are ; but the population was 
limited by the difficulty of procuring a corn subsis- 
tence. The improvements of this kingdom were more 
rapid ; the price of labour rose ; and, with it, the lux- 
ury and comfort of the peasant, who is now decently 
lodged and clothed, and who would think himself in 
the last stage of wretchedness, if he had nothing but 
an iron pot in a turf house, and plenty of potatoes in 
it. The use of the potato was introduced into Ire- 
land when the wretched accommodation of her own 
peasantry bore some proportion to the state of those 
accommodations all over Europe. But they have in- 
creased their population so fast, and, in conjunction 
with the oppressive government of Ireland retarding 
improvement, have kept the price of labour so low, 
that the Irish poor have never been able to emerge 
from their mud cabins, or to acquire any taste for 
cleanliness and decency of appearance. Mr. Curwen 
has the following description of Irish cottages. 

'These mansions of miserable existence, for so they may 
truly be described, conformably to our general estimation of 
those indispensable comforts requisite to constitute the hap- 
piness of rational beings, are most commonly composed of 
two rooms on the ground floor, a most appropriate term, 
for they are literally on the earth ; the surface of which is 
not unfrequently reduced a foot or more, to save the ex- 
pense of so much outward walling. The one is a refectory, 
the other the dormitory. The furniture of the former, if 
the owner ranks in the upper part of the scale of scanti- 
ness, will consist of a kitchen dresser, well provided and 
highly decorated with crockery — not less apparently the 
pride of the husband than the result of female vanity in the 
wife: which, with a table, a chest, -a few stools, and an iron 
pot, complete the catalogue of conveniences generally found, 
as belonging to the cabin; while a spinning-wheel, furnish- 
ed oy the Linen Board, and a loom, ornament vacant spaces, 
that otherwise would remain unfurnished. In fitting up the 
latter, which cannot, on any occasion, or by any display, 
'add a feather to the weight or importance expected to be 
excited by the appearance of the former, the inventory is 
limited to one, and sometimes two beds, serving for the 
repose of the whole family! However downy these may 
be to limbs impatient for rest, their coverings appeared to 
be very slight; and the whole of the apartment created re- 
flections of a very painful nature. Under such privations, 
with a wet mud floor, and a roof in tatters, how idle the 
search for comforts!'— Curwen, I, 112, 113. 

To this we shall add one more on the same sub- 
ject. 

« The gigantic figure, bare- headed before me, had a heard 
that would not have disgraced an ancient Israelite — he was 
without shoes or stockings — and almost a sans-culotte — with 
a coat or rather a jacket, that appeared as if the first blast 
of wind would tear it to tatters. Though his garb was thus 
tattered, he had a manly commanding countenance. I 
asked permission to see the inside of his' cabin, to which I 
received his most courteous assent. On stooping to enter 
at the door I was stopped, and found that permission from 
another was necessary before I could be admitted. A pig, 
which was fastened to a stake driven into the floor, with 
length of rope sufficient to permit him the enjoyment of 
gun and air, demanded some courtesy, which I showed him, 
and was suffered to enter. The wife was engaged in boiling 
Iferead; and by her side, near the fixe, a lovely infant was 



sleeping, without any covering, on bare board. Whether 
the fire gave additional glow to the countenance of the 
babe, or that nature impressed on its unconscious cheek a 
blush that the lot of man should be exposed to such priva- 
tions, I will not decide ; but if the cause be referable to the 
latter, it was in perfect unison with my own feelings. Two 
or three other children crowded round the mother: on their 
rosy countenances health seemed established in spite of filth 
and ragged garments. The dress of the poor woman was 
barely sufficient to satisfy decency. Her countenance bore 
the impression of a set melancholy, tinctured with an 
appearance of ill health. The hovel, which did not exceed 
twelve or fifteen feet in length, and ten in breadth, was 
half obscured by smoke — chimney or window I saw none; 
the door served the various purposes of an inlet to light, 
and the outlet to smoke. The furniture consisted of two 
stools, an iron pot, and a spinning-wheel — while a sack 
stuffed with straw, and a single blanket laid on planks, 
served as a bed for the repose of the whole family. Need I 
attempt to describe my sensations? The statement alone 
cannot fail of conveying, to a mind like yours, an adequate 
idea of them— I could not long remain a witness to this 
acme of human misery. As I left the deplorable habitation, 
the mistress followed me to repeat her thanks for the trifle 
I had bestowed. This gave me an opportunity of observing 
her person more particularly. She was a tall figure, her 
countenance composed of interesting features, and witr 
every appearance of having once been handsome. 

< Unwilling to quit the village without first satisfying my- 
self whether what I had seen was a solitary instance, or a 
sample of its general state ; or whether the extremity of 
poverty I had just beheld had arisen from peculiar improvi- 
dence and want of management in one wretched family ; 
I went into an adjoining habitation, where I found a poor 
old woman of eighty, whose miserable existence was pain- 
fully continued by the maintenance of her grand-daughter. 
Their condition, if possible, was more deplorable.' — Cur-, 
wen, 1, 181, 183. 

This wretchedness, of which all strangers who visit 
Ireland are so sensible, proceeds certainly, in great 
measure, from their accidental use of a food so cheap ? 
that it encourages population to an extraordinary de- 
gree, lowers the price of labour, and leaves the multi- 
tudes which it calls into existence almost destitute of 
every thing but food. Many more live, in conse- 
quence of the introduction of potatoes; but all live in 
greater wretchedness. In the progress of population, 
the potato must of course become at last as difficult 
to be procured as any other food ; and then let the po- 
litical economist calculate what the immensity and 
wretchedness of a people must be, where the farther 
progress of population is checked by the difficulty of 
procuring potatoes. 

The consequence of the long mismanagement and 
oppression of Ireland, and of the singular circumstanc- 
es in which it is placed, is, that it is a semibarbarous 
country: — more shame to those who have thus ill 
treated a fine country, and a fine people ; but it is part 
of the present case of Ireland. The barbarism of Ire- 
land is evinced by the frequency and ferocity of du- 
els, — the hereditary clannish feuds of the common 
people, — and the fights to which they give birth, — 
the atrocious cruelties practised in the insurrections 
of the common people — and their proneness to insur- 
rection. The lower Irish live in a state of greater 
wretchedness than any other people in Europe, in- 
habiting so fine a soil and climate. It is difficult, of- 
ten impossible, to execute the process of law. In 
cases where gentlemen are concerned, it is often not 
even attempted. The conduct of under-sheriffs is of- 
ten very corrupt.* We are afraid the magistracy of 
Ireland is very inferior to that of this country ; the 
spirit of jobbing and bribery is very widely diffused, 
and upon occasions when the utmost purity prevails 
in the sister kingdom. Military force is necessary all 
over the - country, and often for the most common and 
just operations of government. The behaviour of the 
higher to the lower orders is much less gentle and de- 
cent than in England. Blows from superiors to infe- 
riors are more frequent, and the punishment for such 
aggression more doubtful. The word gentleman seems, 
in Ireland, to put an end to most processes of law. 
Arrest a gentleman ! ! ! ! — take out a warrant against 
a gentleman — are modes of operation not very com- 
mon in the administration of Irish justice. If a man 

* The difficulty often is to catch the sheriff. 



IRELAND. 



101 



strikes the meanest peasant in England, he is either 
knocked down in his turn, or immediately taken be- 
fore a magistrate. It is impossible to live in Ireland, 
"without perceiving the various points in which it is in- 
ferior in civilization. Want of unity in feeling and 
interest among the people, — irritability, violence, and 
revenge, — want of comfort and cleanliness in the low- 
er orders, — habitual disobedience to the law, — want of 
confidence in magistrates, — corruption, venality, the 
perpetual necessity of recurring to military force, — all 
carry back the observer to that remote and early con- 
dition of mankind, which an Englishman can learn 
only in the pages of the antiquary or the historian. 
We do not draW this picture for censure, but for truth. 
We admire the Irish, — feel the most sincere pity for 
the state' of Ireland, and think the conduct of the 
English to that country to have been a system of cru- 
elty and contemptible meanness. With such a cli- 
mate, such a soil, and such a people, the inferiority 
of Ireland to the rest of Europe is directly chargeable 
to the long wickedness of the English Government. 

A direct consequence of the present uncivilized 
state of Ireland is, that very little English capital tra- 
vels there. The man who deals in steam-engines, and 
warps and wools, is naturally alarmed by Peep-of-Day 
Boys, and nocturnal Carders ; his object is to buy and 
sell as quickly and quietly as he can ; and he will na- 
turally bear high taxes and rivalry in England, or em- 
igrate to any part of the Continent, or to America, ra- 
ther than plunge into Irish politics and passions. 
There is nothing which Irelaud wants more than large 
manufacturing towns, to take off its superfluous popu- 
lation. But internal peace must come first, and then 
the arts of peace will follow. The foreign manufactu- 
rer will hardly think of embarking his capital, where 
he cannot be sure that his existence is safe. Another 
check to the manufacturing greatness of Ireland, is 
the scarcity — not of coal — but of good coal, cheaply 
raised ; an article in which (in spite of papers in the 
Irish Transactions) they are lamentably inferior to 
the English. 

Another consequence from some of the causes we 
have stated, is the extreme idleness of the Irish la- 
bourer. There is nothing of the value of which the 
Irish seem to have so little notion as that of. time. 
They .scratch, pick, daudle, stare, gape, and do any 
thing but strive and wrestle with the task before 
them. The most ludicrous of all human objects, is an 
Irishman ploughing. — A gigantic figure — a seven foot 
machine for turning potatoes into human nature, 
wrapt up in an immense great coat ; and urging on two 
starved ponies, with dreadful imprecations, and up- 
lifted shillala. The Irish crow discerns a coming per- 
quisite, and is not inattentive to the proceedings of 
the steeds. The furrow which is to be the depository 
of the future crop, is not unlike, either in depth or 
regularity, to those domestic furrows which the nails 
of the meek and much-injured wife plough, in some 
family quarrel, upon the cheeks of the deservedly 
punished husband. The weeds seem to fall content- 
edly, knowing that they have fulfilled their destiny, 
and left behind them, for the resurrection of the ensu- 
ing spring, an abundant and healthy progeny. The 
whole is a scene of idleness, laziness, and poverty, of 
which it is impossible, in this active and enterprizing 
country, to form the most distant conception ; but 
strongly indicative of habits, whether secondary or 
original, which will long present a powerful impedi- 
ment to the improvement of Ireland. 

The Irish character contributes something to retard 
the improvements of that country. The Irishman has 
many good qualities : he is brave, witty, generous, 
eloquent, hospitable, and open-hearted ; but he is 
vain, ostentatious, extravagant, and fond of display — 
light in counsel — deficient in perseverance — without 
skill in private or public economy — an enjoyer, not 
an acquirer — one who despises the slow and patient 
virtues — who wants the superstructure without the 
foundation — the result without the previous operation 
— the oak without the acorn and the three hundred 
years of expectation. The Irish are irascible, pron^ 
to debt, and to fight, and very impatient of the re- 
straints of law. Such a people are not likely to keep 



their eyes steadily upon the main chance, like the 
Scotch or the Dutch. England strove very hard, at 
one period, to compel the Scotch to pay a double 
Church ; — but Sawney took his pen and ink ; and find- 
ing what a sum it amounted to, became furious, and 
drew his sword. God forbid the Irishman should do 
the same ! the remedy, now, would be worse than 
the disease ; but if the oppressions of England had 
been more steadily resisted a century ago, Ireland 
would not have been the scene of poverty, misery, and 
distress which it now is. 

The Catholic religion, among other causes, contri- 
butes to the backwardness and barbarism of Ireland. 
Its debasing superstition, childish ceremonies, and 
the profound submission to the priesthood which it 
teaches, all tend to darken men's minds, to impede 
the progress of knowledge and inquiry, and to prevent 
Ireland from becoming as free, as powerful, and as 
rich as the sister kingdom. Though sincere friends 
to Catholic emancipation, we are no advocates for the 
Catholic religion. We should be very glad to see s, 
general conversion to Protestantism among the Irish ; 
but we do not think that violence, privations, and in- 
capacities, are the proper methods of making prose- 
lytes. 

Such, then, is Ireland, at this period. — a land more 
barbarous than the rest of Europe, because it has 
been worse treated and more cruelly oppressed. Ma- 
ny of the incapacities and privations to which the 
Catholics were exposed, have been removed by law ; 
but, in such instances, they are still incapacitated and 
deprived by custom. Many cruel and oppressive laws 
are still enforced against them. A ninth part of the 
population engrosses all the honours of the country ; 
the other nine pay a tenth of the product of the earth 
for the support of a religion in which they do not be- 
lieve. There is little capital in the country. The 
great and rich men are called by business, or allured 
by pleasure, into England ; their estates are given up 
to factors, and the utmost farthing of rent extorted 
from the poor, who, if they give up the land, cannot 
get employment in manufactures, or regular employ- 
ment in husbandry. The common people use a sort 
of food so very cheap, that . they can rear families, 
who cannot procure employment, and who have little 
more of the comforts of life than food. The Irish are 
light-minded — want of employment has made them 
idle — they are irritable and brave — have a keen re- 
memberance of the past wrongs they have suffered, 
and the present wrongs they are suffering from Eng- 
land. The consequence of all this is, eternal riot and 
insurrection, a whole army of soldiers in time of pro- 
found peace, and general rebellion wmenever England 
is busy with other enemies, or off her guard ! And 
thus it will be while the same causes continue to ope- 
rate, for ages to come, — and worse and worse as the 
rapidly increasing population of the Catholics be- 
comes more and more numerous. 

The remedies are. time and justice ; and that jus- 
tice consists in repealing all laws which make any 
distinction between the two religions ; in placing over 
the government of Ireland, not the stupid, amiable, 
and insignificant noblemen who have too often been 
sent there, but men who feel deeply the wrongs of 
Ireland, and who have an ardent wi'sh to heal them ; 
who will take care that Catholics, when eligible, shall 
be elected ;* who will share the patronage of Ireland 
proportionally among the two parties, and give to 
just and liberal laws the same vigour of execution 
which has hitherto been reserved only for decrees of 
tyranny, and the enactments of oppression. The in- 
justice and hardship of supporting two churches must 
"be put out of sight, if it cannot or ought not to be 
cured. The political economist, the moralist, and 
the satirist, must combine to teach moderation and 
superintendence to the great Irish proprietors. Pub- 
lic talk and clamour may do something for the poor 
Irish, as it did for the slaves in the West Indies. Ire- 
land will become more quiet under such treatment, 
and then more rich, more comfortable, and more civi- 



* Great merit is due to the Whigs for tke patronage b» 
stowed on Catholics. 



102 



WORKS OF THE REV. SIDNEY SMITH. 



ized ; and the horrid spectacle of folly and tyranny, 
which it at present exhibits, may in time be removed 
torn the eyes of Europe. 

There are two eminent Irishmen now in the House 
*f Commons, Lord Castlereagh and Mr. Canning, who 
will subscribe to the justness of every syllable we 
have said upon this subject ; and who have it in their 
power, by making it the condition of their remaining 
in office, to liberate their native country, and raise it 
to its just rank among the nations of the earth. Yet 
the court buys them over, year after year, by the 
pomp and perquisites of office, and year after year 
they come into the House of Commons, feeling deep- 
ly, and describing powerfully, the injuries of five mil- 
lions of their countrymen, — and continue members of 
a government that inflicts those evils, under the piti- 
ful delusion that it is not a cabinet question, — as if the 
scratchings and quarrellings of kings and queens could 
alone cement politicians together in indissoluble unity, 
while the fate and fortune of one-third of the empire 
might be complimented away from one minister to 
another, without the smallest breach in their cabinet 
alliance. Politicians, at least honest politicians, should 
be very flexible and accommodating in little things, 
very rigid and inflexible in great things. And is this 
not a great thing ? Who has painted it in finer and 
more commanding eloquence than Mr. Canning ? 
Who has taken a more sensible and statesman-like 
view of our miserable and cruel policy, than Lord 
Castlereagh? You would think, to hear them, that 
the same planet could not contain them and the op- 
pressors of their country, — perhaps not the same solar 
system. Yet for money, claret, and patronage, they 
lend their countenance, assistance, and friendship, to 
the ministers who are the stern and inflexible enemies 
to the emancipation of Ireland ! 

Thank God that all is not profligacy and corruption 
in the history of that devoted people — and that the 
name of Irishman does not always carry with it the 
idea of the oppressor or the oppressed — the plunderer 
or the plundered — the tyrant or the slave. Great men 
hallow a whole people, and lift up all who live in their 
time. What Irishman does not feel proud that he has 
lived in the days of Grattan ? who has not turned to 
him for comfort, from the false friends and open ene- 
mies of Ireland ? who did not remember him in the 
days of its burnings and wastings and murders ? No 
government ever dismayed him — the world could not 
bribe him — he thought only of Ireland — lived for no 
other object — dedicated to her his beautiful fancy, his 
elegant wit, his manly courage, and all the splendour 
of his astonishing eloquence. He was so born, and so 
gifted, that poetry, forensic skill, elegant literature, 
and all the highest attainments of human genius, were 
within his reach ; but he thought the noblest occupa- 
tion of a man was to make other men happy and free ; 
and in that straight line he went on for fifty years, 
without one side-look, without one yielding thought, 
without one motive in his heart which he might not 
have laid open to the view of God and man. He is 
gone .'—but there is not a single day of his honest life 
of which every good Irishman would not be more 
proud, than of the whole political existence of his 
countrymen, — the annual deserters and betrayers of 
their native land. 



SPRING GUNS. (Edinburgh Review, 1821.) 

The Shooter's Guide. By J. B.Johnson. 12ino. Edwards and 
Knibb. 1819. 

When Lord Dacre (then Mr. Brand) brought into the 
House of Commons his bill for the amendment of the 
game laws, a system of greater mercy and humanity 
was in vain recommended to that popular branch of 
the legislature. The interests of humanity, and the 
interests of the lord of the manor, were not, however, 
opposed to each other ; nor any attempt made to deny 
the superior importance of the last. No such bold or 
alarming topics were agitated ; but it was contended 
that, if laws were less ferocious, there would be more 



partridges — if the lower orders of mankind were not 
torn from their families and banished to Botany Bay, 
hares and pheasants would be increased in number, 
or, at least, not diminished. It is not, however, till 
after long experience, that mankind ever think of re- 
curring to humane expedients for effecting their ob- 
jects. The rulers who ride the people never think of 
coaxing and patting till they have worn out the lashes 
of their whips, and broken the rowels of their spurs. 
The legislators of the trigger replied, that two laws 
had lately passed which would answer their purpose 
of preserving game : the one, an act for transporting 
men found with arms in their hands for the purposes 
of killing game in the night ; the other, an act for 
rendering the buyers of the game equally guilty with 
the seller, and for involving both in the same penalty. 
Three seasons have elapsed since the last of these 
laws was passed ; and we appeal to the experience of 
all the great towns in England, whether the difficulty 
of procuring game in the slightest degree increased? 
— whether hares, partridges, and pheasants are not 
purchased with as much facility as before the passing 
this act ? — whether the price of such unlawful com- 
modities is even in the slightest degree increased ? 
Let the Assize and Sessions' calendars bear witness, 
whether the law for transporting poachers has not 
had the most direct tendency to encourage brutal as- 
saidts and ferocious murders. There is hardly now a 
jail-delivery in which some gamekeeper has not mur- 
dered a poacher — or some poacher a gamekeeper. If 
the question concerned the payment of five pounds, a 
poacher would hardly risk his life rather than be 
taken ; but when he is to go to Botany Bay for seven 
years, he summons together his brother poachers — 
they get brave from rum, numbers, and despair — and 
a bloody battle ensues. 

Another method by which it is attempted to defeat 
the depredations of the poacher, is by setting spring 
guns to murder any person who comes within their 
reach ; and it is to this last new feature in the sup- 
posed game laws, to which, on the present occasion, 
we intend principally to confine our notice. 

We utterly disclaim all hostility to the game laws 
in general. Game ought to belong to those who feed 
it. All the landowners in England are fairly entitled 
to all the game in England. These laws are con- 
structed upon a basis of substantial justice ; but there 
is a great deal of absurdity and tyranny mingled 
with them, and a perpetual and vehement desire on 
the part of the country gentlemen to push the provi- 
sions of these laws up to the highest point of tyranni- 
cal severity. 

' Is it lawful to put to death by a spring gun, or any 
other machine, an unqualified person trespassing upon 
your Avoods or fields in pursuit of game, and who has 
received due notice of your intention, and of the risk 
to which he is exposed V This, we think, is stating 
the question as fairly as can be stated. We purposely 
exclude gardens, orchards, and all contiguity to the 
dwelling-house. We exclude, also, all felonious in- 
tention on the part of the deceased. The object of 
his expedition shall be proved to be game ; and the 
notice he received of his danger shall be allowed to be 
as complete as possible. It must also be part of the 
case, that the spring gun was placed there for the ex- 
press purpose of defending the game, by killing or 
wounding the poacher, or spreading terror, or doing 
any thing that a reasonable man ought to know would 
happen from such a proceeding. 

Suppose any gentleman were to give notice that all 
other persons must abstain from his manors ; that he 
himself and his servants paraded the woods and fields 
with loaded pistols and blunderbusses, and would 
shoot any body who fired at a partridge ; and suppose 
he were to keep his word, and shoot through the head 
some rash trespasser who defied this bravado, and was 
determined to have his sport : — Is there doubt that he 
would be guilty of murder? We suppose no resist- 
ance on the part of the trespasser ; but that, the mo- 
ment he passes the line of demarcation with his dogs 
and gun, he is shot dead by the proprietor of the land 
from behind a tree. If this is not murder, what is 
murder ? We will make the case a little better for 



SPRING GUNS AND MAN TRAPS. 



103 



the homicide squire. It shall he night ; the poacher, 
an unqualified person, steps over the line of demarca- 
tion with his nets and snares, and is instantly shot 
through the head by the pistol of the proprietor. We 
have no doubt that this would be murder — that it ought 
to be considered as murder, and punished as murder. 
We think this so clear, that it would be a waste of 
time to argue it. There is no kind of resistance on 
the part of the deceased; no attempt to run away; 
he is not even challenged : but instantly shot dead by 
the proprietor of the wood, for no other crime than 
the intention of killing game unlawfully. We do not 
suppose that any man, possessed of the elements of 
law and common sense, would deny this to be a case 
of murder, let the previous notice to the deceased 
have been as perfect as it could be. It is true, a tres- 

Easser in a park may be killed ; but then it is when 
e will not render himself to the keepers, upon an 
hue and cry to stand to the king's peace. But deer 
are property, game is not ; and this power of slaying 
deer-stealers is by the 21st Edward I„ de Malifac.tori- 
bus in Parcis, and by 3d and 4th William & Mary, c. 
10. So rioters may be killed, house-burners, ravishers, 
felons refusing to be arrested, felons escaping, felons 
breaking jail, men resisting a civil process — may all 
be put to death. All these cases of justifiable homi- 
cide are laid down and admitted in our books. But 
whoever heard, that to pistol a poacher was justifi- 
able homicide ? It has long been decided, that it is 
unlawful to kill a dog who is pursuing game in a 
manor. ' To decide the contrary,' says Lord Ellen- 
borough, l would outrage reason and sense.' (Vere v. 
Lord Cawdor and King, 11 East, 3S6.) Pointers have 
always been treated by the legislature with great de- 
licacy and consideration. To ' wish to be a dog and to 
bay the moon, 1 is not quite so mad a wish as the poet 
thought it. 

If these things are so, what is the difference be- 
tween the act of firing yourself, and placing an engine 
which does the same thing? In the one case your 
hand pulls the trigger ; in the other, it places the wire 
which communicates with the trigger, and causes the 
death of the trespasser. There is the same intention 
of slaying in both cases — there is precisely the same 
human agency in both cases ; only the steps are rather 
more numerous in the latter case. As to the bad 
effects of allowing proprietors of game to put tres- 
passers to death at once, or to set guns that will do it, 
we can have no hesitation in saying, that the first 
method, of giving the power of life and death to 
esquires, would be by far the most humane. For, as 
we have observed in a previous Essay on the Game 
laws, a live armigeral spring gun would distinguish an 
accidental trespasser from a real poacher — a woman 
or a boy from a man — perhaps might spare a friend 
or an acquaintance — or a father of a family with ten 
children — or a small freeholder who voted for admin- 
istration. But this new rural artillery must destroy, 
without mercy and selection, every one who ap- 
proaches it. 

In the case of Hot versus Wilks, Esq., the four 
judges, Abbot, Bailey, Holroyd, and Best, gave their 
opinions seriatim on points connected with this ques- 
tion. In this case, as reported in Chetwynd's edition 
of Burn's Justice, 1820, vol. ii. p. 500, Abbot C. J. ob- 
serves as follows : — 

1 1 cannot say that repeated and increasing acts of aggression 
may not reasonably call for increased means of defence and 
protection. I believe that many of the persons who cause en- 
gines of this description to be placed in their grounds, do not 
do so with an intention to injure any person, but resdly believe 
that the publication of notices will prevent any person from 
sustaining an injury; and that no person having the notice 
given him, will be weak and foolish enough to expose himself 
to the perilous consequences of his trespass. Many persons 
who place such engines in their grounds, do so for the purpose 
of preventing, by means of terror, injury to their property, 
rather than from any motive of doing malicious injury.' 

' Increased means of defence and protection,' but in- 
creased (his lordship should remember,) from the pay- 
ment of five pounds to instant death — and instant death 
inflicted, not by the arm of law, but by the arm of the 
proprietor; could the Lord Chief Justice of the King's 



Bench intend to say, that the impossibility of putting 
an end to poaching by other means, would justify the 
infliction of death upon the offender ? Is he so igno- 
rant of the philosophy of punishing, as to imagine he 
has nothing to do but to give ten stripes instead of two, 
an hundred instead of ten, and a thousand, if an hun-' 
dred will not do ? to substitute the prison for pecuniary 
fines, and the gallows instead of the jail? It is im- 
possible so enlightened a judge can forget, that the 
sympathies of mankind must be consulted ; that it 
would be wrong to break a person upon the wheel for 
stealing a penny loaf, and that gradations in punish- 
ments must be carefully accommodated to gradations 
in crime ; that if poaching is punished more than man- 
kind in general think it ought to be punished, the fault 
will either escape with impunity, or the delinquent be 
driven to desperation ; that if poaching and murder are 
punished equally, every poacher will be an assassin. 
Besides, too, if the principle is right in the unlimited 
and unqualified manner in which the Chief Justice puts 
it — if defence goes on increasing with aggression, the 
legislature at least must determine upon their equal 
pace. If an act of Parliament made it a capital of- 
fence to poach upon a manor, as it is to commit a bur- 
glary in a dwelling-house, it might then be as lawful 
to shoot a person for trespassing upon your manor, as 
it is to kill a thief for breaking into your house. But, 
the real question is — and so in sound reasoning his 
lordship should have put it — ' If the, law at this mo- 
ment determines the aggression to be in such a state, 
that it merits only a pecuniary fine after summons and 
proof, has any sporadic squire the right to say, that it 
shall be punished with death, before any summons and 
without any proof ?' 

It appears to us, too, very singular to say, that many 
persons who cause engines of this description to be 
placed in their ground, do not do so with an intention 
of injuring any person, but really believe that the pub- 
lication of notices will prevent any person from sus- 
taining an injury, and that no person, having the no- 
tice given him, will be weak and foolish enough to ex- 
pose himself to the perilous consequences of his tres- 
pass. But if this is the real belief of the engineer — if 
he thinks the mere notice will keep people away — then 
he must think it a mere inutility that the guns should 
be placed at all ; if he thinks that many will be de- 
terred, and a few come, then he must mean to shoot 
those few. He who believes his gun will never be 
called upon to do its duty, need set no gun, and trust 
to rumour of their being set, or being loaded, for his 
protection. Against the gun and the powder we have 
no complaint ; they are perfectly fair and admissible : 
our quarrel is with the bullets. He who sets a loaded 
gun, means it should go off if it is touched. But what 
signifies the mere empty wish that there may be no 
mischief, when I perform an action which my common 
sense tells me may produce the worst mischief? If I 
hear a great noise in the street, and fire a bullet to keep 
people quiet, I may not perhaps have intended to kill ; 
I may have wished to have produced quiet by mere 
terror, and I may have expressed a strong hope that 
my object has been effected without the destruction of 
human life. Still I have done that which every man 
of sound intellect knows is likely to kill ; and if any 
one falls from my act, I am guilty of murder. ' Fur- 
ther,' (says Lord Coke,) c if there be an evil intern, 
though that intent extendeth not to death, it is murder. 
Thus, if a man, knowing that many people are in the 
street, throw a stone over the wall, intending only to 
frighten them, or to give them a little hurt, and there- 
upon one is killed — this is murder — for he hath an ill 
intent ; though that intent extended not to death, and 
though he knew not the party slain.' (3 Inst. 57.) If 
a man is not mad, he must be presumed to foresee 
common consequences if he puts a bullet into a spring 
gun — he may be supposed to foresee that it will kill 
any poacher who touches the wire — and to that conse- 
quence he must stand. We do not suppose all preser- 
vers of game to be so bloodily inclined that they 
would prefer the death of a poacher to his staying 
away. Their object is to preserve game ; they have 
no objection to preserve the lives of their fellow-crea- 
tures also, if both can exist at the same time ; if Hot 



104 



WORKS OF THE REV. SIDNEY SMITH. 



the least worthy of God's creatures must fall — the 
rustic without a soul — not the Christian partridge— not 
the immortal pheasant — not the rational woodcock, or 
the accountable hare. 

The Chief Justice quotes the instance of glass and 
spikes fixed upon walls. He cannot mean to infer 
from this, because the law connives at the infliction 
of such small punishments for the protection of pro- 
perty, that it does allow, or ought to allow, proprie- 
tors to proceed to the punishment of death. Small 
means of annoying trespassers may be consistently 
admitted by the law, though more severe ones are 
forbidden, and ought to be forbidden ; unless it fol- 
lows, tbat what is good in any degree, is good in the 
highest degree. You may correct a servant boy with 
a switch ; but if you bruise him sorely, you are to be 
indicted — if you kill him, you are hanged. A black- 
smith corrected his servant with a bar of iron; the 
boy died, and the blacksmith was executed. (Grey's 
Case, Kel. 64, 65.) A woman kicked and stamped on 
the belly of her child — she was found guilty of mur- 
der. (1 East, JP. C. 261.) Si immoderate suo jure 
utatur, tunc reus homicidii sit. There is, besides, this 
additional difference in the two cases put by the Chief 
Justice, that no publication of notices can be so plain, 
in the case of the guns, as the sight of the glass or 
the spikes ; for a trespasser may not believe in the 
notice which he receives, or he may think he shall 
see a gun, and so avoid it, or that he may have the 
good luck to avoid it, if he does not see it ; whereas, 
of the presence of the glass or the spikes he can have 
no doubt ; and he has no hope of placing his hand in 
any spot where they are not. In the one case, he 
cuts his ringers upon full and perfect notice, the notice 
of his own senses ; in the other case, he loses his life 
after a notice which he may disbelieve, and by an 
engine which he may hope to escape. 

Mr. Justice Bailey observes, in the same case, that 
it is not an indictable offence to set spring guns : per- 
haps not. It is not an indictable offence to go about 
with a loaded pistol, intending to shoot anybody who 
grins at you : but, if you do it, you are hanged : many 
inchoate acts are innocent, the consummation of 
which is a capital offence. 

This is not a case where the motto applies of Vo- 
lenti non fit injuria. The man does not will to be 
hurt, but he wills to get the game ; and, with that 
rash confidence natural to many characters, believes 
he shall avoid the evil and gain the good. On the 
contrary, it is a case which exactly arranges itself 
under the maxim, Quando aliquid prohibetur ex directo, 
prohibetur et per obiiquum. Give what notice he may, 
the proprietor cannot lawfully shoot a trespasser (who 
neither runs nor resists) with a loaded pistol ; he can- 
not do it ex directo • how then can he do it per obii- 
quum, by arranging on the ground the pistol which 
commits the murder ? 

Mr. Justice Best delivers the following opinion. His 
lordship concluded as follows : 

' This case has been discussed at the bar, as if these engines 
were exclusively resorted to for the protection of game; but 
I consider them as lawfully applicable to the protection of 
every species of property against unlawful trespassers. But if 
even they might not lawfully be used for the protection of 
game, I, for one, should be extremely glad to adopt such 
means, if they were found sufficient for that purpose ; be- 
cause I think it a great object that gentlemen should have a 
temptation to reside in the country, amongst their neighbours 
and tenantry, whose interests must be materially advanced by 
such a circumstance. The links of society are thereby better 
preserved, and the mutual advantage and dependence of the 
higher classes of society, existing between each other, more 
beneficially maintained. We have seen, in a neighbouring 
country, the baneful consequences of the non-residence of the 
landed gentry ; and in an ingenious work, lately published by 
a foreigner, we learn the fatal effects of a like system on the 
Continent. By preserving game, gentlemen are tempted to 
reside in the country; and, considering that the diversion 
of the field is the only one of which they can partake on the 
estates, I am of opinion that, for the purpose I have stated, it 
is of essential importance that this species of property should 
be inviolably protected.' 

If this speech of Mr. Justice Best is correctly re- 
ported, it follows, that a man may put his fcllow- 
Cieatures to death for any infringement of his proper- 



ty — for picking the sloes and blackberries off hi» 
hedges — 'for breaking a few dead sticks out of them 
by night or by day — with resistance or without resist- 
ance — with warning or without warning ; a strange 
method this of keeping up the links of society, and 
maintaining the dependence of the lower upon the 
higher classes. It certainly is of importance that 
gentlemen should reside on their estates in the coun- 
try ; but not that gentlemen with such opinions as 
these should reside. The more they are absent 
from the country, the less strain will there be upon 
those links to which the learned judge alludes — the 
more firm that dependence upon which he places so 
just a value. In the case of Dean versus Ckiyton,Bart., 
the Court of Common Pleas were equally divided upon 
the lawfulness of killing a dog coursing a hare by 
means of a concealed dog-spear. We confess that we 
cannot see the least difference between transfixing 
with a spear, or placing a spear so that it will transfix ; 
and, therefore, if Vere versus Lord Cawdor and King, 
is good law, the action could have been maintained in 
Dean versus Clayton ; but the solemn consideration 
concerning the life of the pointer is highly creditable 
to all the judges. They none of them say that it is 
lawful to put a trespassing pointer to death under any 
circumstances, or that they themselves would be glad 
to do it ; they all seem duly impressed with the recol 
lection that they are deciding the fate of an animal 
faithfully ministerial to the pleasures of the uppei 
classes of society : there is an awful desire to do thcii 
duty, and a dread of any rash and intemperate deci- 
sion. Seriously speaking, we can hardly believe this 
report of Mr. Justice Best's speech to be correct ; ye« 
Ave take it from a book which guides the practice of 
nine-tenths of all the magistrates in England. Does ;i 
judge — a cool, calm man, in whose kands are the issues 
of life and death, from whom so many miserable trem- 
bling human beings await their destiny — docs he tell 
us, and tell us in a court of justice, that lie places such 
little value on the life of man, that he would plot the 
destruction of his fellow-creatures for the preservation 
of a few hares and partridges ? i Nothing which falls 
from me' (says Mr. Justice Bailey) < shall have a ten- 
dency to encourage the practice.' ' I consider them,' 
(says Mr. Justice Best) ' as lawfully applicable to the 
protection of every species of property; but even if 
they might not lawfully be used for the protection of 
game, I, for one, should be extremely glad to adopt than, 
if they were found sufficient for that purpose.' Can 
any man doubt to which of these two magistrates he 
would rather entrust a decision on his fife, his liberty, 
and his possessions ? We should be very sorry to mis- 
represent Mr. Justice Best, and will give to his disa- 
vowal of such sentiments, if he does disavow them, all 
the publicity in our poAver ; but Ave have cited his very 
words conscientiously and correctly, as they are given 
in the LaAV Report. We have no doubt he meant to do 
his duty ; we blame not his motives, but his feelings 
and his reasoning. 

Let it be observed, that in the whole of this case, 
we have put every circumstance in favour of the mur- 
derer. We have supposed it to be in the night time ; 
but a man may be shot in the day* b) r a spring gun. 
We have supposed the deceased to be a poacher ; but 
he may be a very innocent man, who has missed his 
way — an unfortunate botanist, or a lover. We have 
supposed notice ; but it is a very possible event that 
the dead man may have been utterly ignorant of the 
notice. This instrument, so highly approved of by 
Mr. Justice Best — this knitter together of the different 
orders of societjr — is levelled promiscuously against the 
guilty or the innocent, the ignorant and the informed. 
No man who sets such an infernal machine, believes 
that it can reason or discriminate ; it is made to mur- 
der all alike, and it does murder all alike. 

Blackstone says, that the law of England, like that 
of every other well regulated community, is tender of 
the public peace, and careful of the lives of the sub- 
jects ; that it Avill not suffer with impunity any crime 



* Large damages have been given for wounds inflicted by 
spring guns set in a garden in the day-time, where the party 
wounded had no notice. 



SPRING GUNS AND MAN TRAPS. 



105 



to be prevented by death, unless the same, if committed, 
would also be punished by death? {Commentaries, vol. 
iv. 182.) < The law sets so high a value upon the life 
of a man, that it always intends some misbehaviour in 
the person who take* it away, unless by the command 
or express permission of the law.' ' And as to the 
necessity which excuses a man who kills another se 
defendendo, Lord Bacon calls even that necessitas cul- 
pabilis.' (Commentaries, vol. iv. p. 187.) So far this 
luminary of the law. But the very amusements of the 
" rich are, hi the estimation of Mr. Justice Best, of so 
great importance, that the poor are to be exposed to 
sudden death who interfere with them. There are 
other persons of the same opinion with this magistrate 
respecting the pleasures of the rich. In the last ses- 
sion of Parliament a bill was passed, entitled l An act 
for the summary punishment, in certain cases, of per- 
sons wilfully or' maliciously damaging, or committing 
trespasses on public or private property.' Anno primo, 
— (a bad specimen of what is to happen,) — Georgii IV. 
Regis, cap. 56. In this act it is provided, that < if any 
person shall wilfully, or maliciously, commit any da- 
mage, injury, or spoil, upon any building, fence, hedge, 
gate, style, guide-post, mile-stone, tree, wood, under- 
wood, orchard, garden, nursery-gTound, crops, vegeta- 
bles, plants, land, or other matter or thing growing or 
being therein, or to or upon any real or personal pro- 
perty of any nature or kind soever, he may be imme- 
diately seized by any body, without a warrant, taken 
before a magistrate, and hned (according to the mis- 
chief he has done) to the extent of bl. ; or, in default 
of payment, may be committed to the jail for three 
months.' And at the end comes a clause, exempting 
from the operation of this act all mischief done in 
hunting, and by shooters who are qualified. This is 
surely the most impudent piece of legislation that ever 
crept into the statute book ; and, coupled with Mr. 
Justice Best's declaration, constitutes the following 
affectionate relation between the different orders of 
society. Says the higher link to the lower, i If you 
meddle with my game, I will immediately murder 
you ; if you commit the slightest injury upon my real 
or personal property, I will take you before a magis- 
trate and fine you five pounds. I am in Parliament, 
and you are not ; and I have just brought in an act of 
Parliament for that purpose. But so important is it to 
you that my pleasures should not be interrupted, that 
I have exempted myself and friends from the opera- 
tion of this act ; and Ave claim the right (without al- 
lowing you any such summary remedy) of riding over 
your fences, hedges, gates, stiles, guide-posts, mile- 
stones, woods, underwoods, orchards, gardens, nurse- 
ry grounds, crops, vegetables, plants, lands, or other 
matters or things, growing or being thereupon — inclu- 
ding your children and yourselves, if you do not get 
out oif the way.' Is there, upon earth, such a mockery 
of justice as an act of Parliament, pretending to pro- 
tect property, sending a poor hedge-breaker to jail, 
and specially exempting from its operation the accu- 
sing and the judging squire, who, at the tail of the 
hounds, have that morning, perhaps, ruined as much 
wheat and seeds as would purchase fuel a whole year 
for a whole village ? 

It cannot be urged, in extenuation of such a murder 
as we have described, that the artificer of death had 
no particular malice against the deceased ; that his ob- 
ject was general, and his indignation levelled against 
offenders in the aggregate. Every body knows that 
there is a malice by implication of law. 

' In general, any formal design of doing mischief 
may be called malice ; and therefore, not such killing 
only as proceeds from premeditated hatred and re- 
venge against the person killed, but also, in many 
other cases, such as is accompanied with those cir- 
cumstances that show the heart to be preversely 
wicked, is adjudged to be of malice prepense.' — 2 
Haw. c. 31. 

1 For, where the law makes use of the term, malice 
aforethought, as descriptive of the crime of murder, it 
is not to be understood in that narrow restrained sense 
in which the modern use of the word malice is apt to 
lead one, a principle of malevolence to particulars : 
for the law, by the term malice, malitia, in this in- 



stance, meaneth, that the fact hath been attended 
with such circumstances as are the ordinary symp- 
toms of a wicked heart, regardless of social duty, and 
fatally bent on mischief.' — Fost. 256, 257. 

Ferocity is the natural weapon of the common peo- 
ple. If gentlemen of education and property contend 
with them at this sort of warfare, they will probably 
be defeated in the end. If spring guns are generally 
set — if the common people are murdered by them, 
and the legislature do not interfere, the posts of game- 
keeper and lord of the manor will soon be posts of 
honour and danger. The greatest curse under heaven 
(witness Ireland) is a peasantry demoralized by the 
barbarity and injustice of their rulers. 

It is expected by some persons, that the severe 
operation of these engines will put an end to the trade 
of a poacher. This has always been predicated of 
every fresh operation of severity, that it was to put 
an end to poachnig. But if this argument is good for 
one thing, it is good for another. Let the first pick- 
pocket who is taken be hung alive by the ribs, and let 
him be a fortnight in wasting to death. Let us seize 
a little grammar boy, who is robbing orchards, tie his 
arms and legs, throw over him a delicate puff-paste, 
and bake him in a bun-pan in an oven. If ^u^ciung 
can be extirpated by intensity of punishment, why 
not all other crimes f If racks and gibbets and ten- 
ter-hooks are the best method of bringing back the 
golden age, why do we refrain from so easy a receipt 
for abolishing every species of wickedness ? The best 
way of answering a bad argument is not to stop it, 
but to let it go on in its course till it leaps over the 
boundaries of common sense. There is a little book 
called Beccaria on Crimes and Punishments, which we 
strongly recommend to the attention of Mr. Justice 
Best. He who has not read it, is neither fit to make 
laws, nor to administer them when made. 

As to the idea of abolishing poaching altogether, 
we will believe that poaching is abolished when it is 
found impossible to buy game; or when they have 
risen so greatly in price, that none but people of for- 
tune can buy them. But we are convinced this never 
can, and never will happen. All the traps and guns 
in the world will never prevent the wealth of the mer- 
chant and manufacturer from commanding the game 
of the landed gentleman. You may, in the pursuit of 
this visionary purpose, render the common people sa- 
vage, ferocious, and vindictive ; you may disgrace 
your laws by enormous punishments, and the national 
character by these new secret assassinations ; but you 
will never separate the wealthy glutton from the phea- 
sant. The best way is, to take what you want, and 
to sell the rest fairly and openly. This is the real 
spring gun and steel trap which will annihilate, not 
the unlawful trader, but the unlawful trade. 

There is a sort of horror in thinking of a whole land 
filled with lurking engines of death — machinations 
against human life under every green tree — traps and 
guns in every dusky dell and bosky bourn — the ferce 
naturd, the lords of manors eyeing their peasantry as 
so many butts and marks, and panting to hear the 
click of the trap, and to see the flash of the gun. 
How any human being, educated in liberal knowledge 
and Christian feeling, can doom to certain destruction 
a poor wretch, tempted by the sight of animals that 
naturally appear to him to belong to one person as 
well as another, we are at a loss to conceive. We 
cannot imagine how he could live in the same village, 
and see the widow and orphans of the man whose 
blood he had shed for such a trifle. We consider a 
person who could do this, to be deficient in the very 
elements of morals— to want that sacred regard to hu- 
man fife which is one of the corner stones of civil so- 
ciety. If he sacrifices the life of man for his mere 
pleasures, he would do so, if he dared, for the lowest 
and least of his passions. He maybe defended, per- 
haps, by the abominable injustice of the game laws — 
though we think and hope he is not. But there rests 
upon his head, arid there is marked in his account, the 
deed and indelible sin of blood-guiltiness. 



106 



WORKS OF THE REV. SIDNEY SMITH. 



PRISONS. (Edinburgh Review, 1821.) 



* Thoughts on the Criminal Prisons of this Country, occa- 
sioned by the Bill now in the House of Commons, for Con- 
solidating and Amending the Laws relating to Prisons ; 
with some Remarks on the Practice of looking to the Task- 
Master of the Prison rather than to the Chaplain for the Re- 
formation of Offenders ; and of purchasing the Work of 
those whom the Law has condemned to Hard Labour as a 
Punishment, by allowing them to spend a Portion of their 
Earnings during their Imprisonment. By George Holford, 
Esq. M.°P. Rivington. 1821. 

2. Gurney on Prisons. Constable and Co. 1819. 

3. Report of Society for bettering the Condition of Prisons. 
JBensley. 1820. 

There are, in every county in England, large pub- 
lic schools, maintained at the expense of the county, 
for the encouragement of profligacy and vice, and for 
providing a proper succession of housebreakers, prof- 
ligates, and thieves. They are schools, too, conduct- 
ed without the smallest degree of partiality or favour; 
there being no man (however mean his birth, or ob- 
scure his situation,) who may not easily procure ad- 
mission to them. The moment any young person 
evinces the slightest propensity for these pursuits, he 
is provided with food, clothing, and lodging ; and put 
to his studies under the most accomplished thieves 
and cut-throats the county can supply. There is not, 
to be sure, a formal arrangement of lectures, after the 
manner of our universities ; but the petty larcenous 
strippling, being left destitute of every species of em- 
ployment, and locked up with accomplished villains 
as idle as himself, listens to their pleasant narrative 
of successful crimes, and pants for the hour of free- 
dom, that he may begin the same bold and interesting 
career. 

This is a perfectly true picture of the prison estab- 
lishments of many counties in England, and was so, 
till very lately, of almost all ; and the effects so com- 
pletely answered the design, that in the year 1818, 
there were committed to the jails of the United King- 
dom more than one hundred and seven thousand per- 
sons !* a number supposed to be greater than that of 
all the commitments in the other kingdoms of Europe 
put together. 

The bodily treatment of prisoners has been greatly 
improved since the time of Howard. There is still, 
however, much to do ; and the attention of good and 
humane people has been lately called to their state of 
moral discipline. 

It is inconceivable to what a spirit of party this has 
given birth ; — all the fat and sleek people, — the enjoy- 
ers, — the mumpsimus, and l well as we are ' people, 
are perfectly outrageous at being compelled to do their 
duty : and to sacrifice time and money to the lower or- 
ders of mankind. Their first resource was, to deny all 
the facts which were brought forward for the purposes 
of amendment ; and the alderman's sarcasm of the 
Turkey carpet in jails was bandied from one hard- 
hearted and fat-witted gentleman to another : but the 
advocates of prison-improvement are men in earnest — 
not playing at religion, but of deep feeling, and of in- 
defatible industry in charitable pursuits. Mr. Buxton 
went in company with men of the most irreproachable 
veracity ; and found, in the heart of the metropolis, 
and in a prison of which the very Turkey carpet alder- 
man was an official visitor, scenes of horror, filth, and 
cruelty, which would have disgraced even the interior 
of a slave-ship. 

This dislike of innovation proceeds sometimes from 
the disgust excited by false humanity, canting hypoc- 
risy, and silly enthusiasm. It proceeds also from a 
stupid and indiscriminate horror of change, whether 
of evil for good, or good for evil. There is also much 
party spirit in these matters. A good deal of these 
humane projects and institutions originates from Dis- 
senters. The plunderers of the public, the jobbers, 
and those who sell themselves to some great man, 
who sells himself to a greater, all scent from afar, the 
danger of political change — are sensible that the cor- 

* Report of Prison Society, xiv. 



rection of one abuse may lead to that of another — 
feel uneasy at any visible operation of public spirit 
and justice — hate and tremble at a man who exposes 
and rectifies abuses from a sense of duty — and think, 
if such things are suffered to be, that their candle- 
ends and cheese-parings are no longer safe : and these 
sagacious persons, it must be said for them, are not 
very wrong in this feeling. Providence, which has de- 
nied to them all that is great and good, has given 
them a fine tact for the preservation of their plunder : 
their real enemy is the spirit of inquiry — the dislike 
of wrong — the love of right — and the courage and dil- 
igence which are the concomitants of these virtues. — 
When once this spirit is up, it maybe as well directed 
to one abuse as another. To say you must not torture 
a prisoner with bad air and bad food, and to say you 
must not tax me without my consent, or that of my 
representative, are both emanations of the same prin- 
ciple, occurring to the same sort of understanding, 
congenial to the same disposition, published, protect- 
ed, and enforced by the same qualities. This it is that 
really excites the horror against Mrs. Fry, Mr. Gur- 
ney, Mr. Bennet, and Mr. Buxton. Alarmists such as 
we have described have no particular wish that prisons 
should be dirty, jailers cruel, or prisoners wretched ; 
they care little about such matters either way ; but all 
their malice and meanness are called up into action 
when they see secrets brought to light, and abuses 
giving way before the diffusion of intelligence, and the 
aroused feelings of justice and compassion. As for us, 
we have neither love of change, nor fear of it ; but a 
a love of what is just and wise, as far as we are able 
to find it out. In this spirit we shall offer a few obser- 
vations upon prisons, and upon the publications before 
us. 

The new law should keep up the distinction between 
jails and houses of .correction. One of each should 
exist in every county, either at a distance from each 
other, or in such a state of juxtaposition that they 
might be under the same governor. To the jail should 
be committed all persons accused of capital offences, 
whose trials would come on at the Assizes ; to the 
house of correction, all offenders whose cases would be 
cognizable at the Quarter Sessions. Sentence of im- 
prisonment in the house of correction, after trial, 
should cary with it hard labour ; sentence of impris- 
onment in the jail, after trial, should imply an exemp- 
tion from compulsory labour. There should be no 
compulsory labour in jails — only in houses of correc- 
tion. In using the terms Jail and House of Correction, 
we shall always attend to these distinctions. Prison- 
ers for trial should not only not be compelled to labour, 
but they should have every indulgence shown to them 
compatible with safety. No chains— much better diet 
than they commonly have — all possible access to their 
friends and relations — and means of earning money if 
they choose it. The broad and obvious distinction 
between prisoners before and after trial should con- 
stantly be attended to ; to violate it is gross tyranny 
and cruelty. 

The jails for men and women should be so far sepa- 
rated, that nothing could be seen or heard from one to 
the other. The men should be divided into two class- 
es : 1st, those who are not yet tried ; 2d, those who are 
tried and convicted. The first class should be divided 
into those who are accused as misdemeanants and as 
felons ; and each of these into first misdemeanants 
and second misdemeanants, men of better and worse 
character ; and the same with fehms. The second 
class should be divided into, 1st, persons condemned to 
death ; 2dly, persons condemned for transportation : 
3dly, first class of confined, or men of the best char- 
acter under sentence of confinement ; Athly, second 
confined, or men of worse character under sentence of 
confinement. To these are to be added separate places 
for king's evidence, boys, lunatics, and places for the 
reception of prisoners, before they can be examined 
and classed : — a chapel, hospital, yards, and work- 
shops for such as are willing to work. 
The classifications in jails will then be as follows: — 



STATE OF PRISONS. 



107 



Men before Trial Men after Trial. 

1st Misdemeanants Sentenced to death. 

2d Ditto. Ditto transportation. 

1st Felons. 1st Confined. 

2d Ditto. 2d Confined. 

Other Divisions in a Jail 

• King's Evidence. 
Criminal Lunatics. 
Boys. 

Prisoners on their first reception. 
And the same divisions for Women. 

But there is a division still more important than any 
of these; and that is, a division into much smaller 
numbers than are gathered together in prisons : — 40, 
50, and even 70 and 80 felons, are often placed togeth- 
er in one yard, and five together for months previous 
to iheir trial. Any classification of offences, while 
there is such a multitude living together of one class, 
is perfectly nugatory and ridiculous ; no character can 
escape from corruption and extreme vice in such a 
school. The law ought to be peremptory against the 
confinement of more than fifteen persons together of 
the same class. Unless some measure of this kind is 
resorted to, all reformations in prisons is impossible.* 

A very great, and a very neglected object in prisons, 
V+ diet. There should be, in every jail and house of 
..orrection, four sorts of diet ; — 1st, Bread and water ; 
*dly, Common prison diet, to be settled by the magis- 
rates ; 3dly, Best prison diet, to be settled by ditto ; 
\thly, Free diet, from which spirituous liquors alto- 
gether, and fermented liquors in excess, are excluded. 
All prisoners, before trial, should be allowed best pri- 
son diet, and be upon free diet if they could afford it. 
Every sentence for imprisonment should expressly 
mention to which diet the prisoner is confined ; and 
ao other diet should be, on any account, allowed to 
mch prisoner after his sentence. Nothing can be so 
preposterous, and criminally careless, as the way in 
Vhich persons confined upon sentence are suffered to 
ive in prison. Misdemeanants, who have money in 
iheir pockets, may be seen in many of our prisons 
with fish, buttered veal, rump steaks, and every other 
Kind of luxury ; and as the practice prevails of allow- 
ing them to purchase a pint of ale each, the rich pri- 
soner purchases many pints of ale in the name of his 
poorer brethren, and drinks them himself. A jail 
should be a place of punishment, from which men re- 
coil with horror — a place of real suffering, painful to 
the memory, terrible to the imagination ; but if men 
can live idly, and live luxuriously, in a clean, well- 
aired, well- warmed, spacious habitation, is it any won- 
der that they set the law at defiance, and brave that 
magistrate who restores them to their former luxury 
and ease ? There are a set of men well known to jail- 
ers, called Family-men, who are constantly returning 
to jail, and who may be said to spend the greater part 
of their life there, — up to the time when they are 
hanged. 
Minutes of Evidence taken before Select Committee on Gaols' 

1 Mr. William Beeby, Keeper of the New Clerkenwell 
Prison.— Have you many prisoners that return to you on 
re-commitment ? A vast number ; some of them are fre- 
quently discharged in the morning, and I have them back 
again in the evening : or they have been discharged in the 
evening, and I have had them back in the morning.' — Evi- 
dence beforethe Committee of the House of Commons in 1819, 
p. 278. 

'Francis Const, Esq., Chairman of the Middlesex Quarter 
Sessions. — Has that opinion been confirmed by any conduct 
you have observed in prisoners that have come before you 
for trial ? I only judge from the opposite thing, that, going 
into a place where they can be idle, and well protected 
from any inconveniences of the weather, and other things 
that poverty is open to, they are not amended at all ; they 
laugh at it frequently, and desire to go to the House of Cor- 
rection. Once or twice, in the early part of the winter, 
upon sending a prisoner for two months, he has asked 
whether he could not stay longer, or words to that effect. 
It i* an insulting way of saying they like it.' — Evidence be- 
fore the Committee of the House of Commons in 1819, p. 285. 

* We should much prefer solitary imprisonment ; but are 
at present speaking of the regulations in jails where that 
system is excluded. 



The fact is, that a thief is a very dainty gentleman. 
Male parta cito dilabuntur. He does not rob to lead a 
life of mortification and self-denial. The difficulty of 
controlling his appetites, in all probability, first led 
him to expenses, which made him a thief to support 
them. Having lost character, and become desperate, 
he orders crab and lobster and veal cutlets at a public 
house, while a poor labourer is refreshing himself with 
bread and cheese. The most vulnerable part of a 
thief is his belly ; and there is nothing he feels more 
bitterly in confinement than a long course of water- 
gruel and flour-puddings. It is a mere mockery of 
punishment to say, that such a man shall spend his 
money hi luxurious viands, and sit down to dinner with 
fetters on his feet, and fried pork in his stomach. 

Restriction to diet in prisons is still more necessary, 
when it is remembered that it is impossible to avoid 
making a prison, in some respects, more eligible than 
the home of a culprit. It is almost always more spa- 
cious, cleaner, better ventilated, better warmed. All 
these advantages are inevitable on the side of the pri- 
son. The means, therefore, that remain of making a 
prison a disagreeable place, are not to be neglected ; 
and of these, none are more powerful than the regula- 
tion of diet. If this is neglected, the meaning of sen- 
tencing a man to prison will be this — and it had better 
be put in these words — 

' Prisoner at the bar, you are fairly convicted, by a 
jury of your country, of having feloniously stolen two 
pigs, the property of Stephen Muck, farmer. The 
court having taken into consideration the frequency 
and enormity of this offence, and the necessity of re- 
straining it with the utmost severity of punishment, do 
order and adjudge that you be confined for six months 
in a house larger, better, better aired, and warmer 
than your own, in company with 20 or 30 young per- 
sons in as good health and spirits as yourself. You 
need do no work, and you may have any thing for 
breakfast, dinner, and supper you can buy. In pass- 
ing this sentence, the court hope that your example 
will be a warning to others; and that evil-disposed 
persons will perceive, from your suffering, that the 
laws of their country are not to be broken with impu- 
nity.' 

As the diet, according to our plan, is always to be 
a part of the sentence, a judge will, of course, consi- 
der the nature of the offence for which the prisoner is 
committed, as well as the quality of the prisoner: and 
we have before stated, that all prisoners, before trial, 
should be upon the best prison diet, and unrestricted 
as to what they could purchase, always avoiding in- 
temperance. 

These gradations of diet being fixed in all prisons, 
and these definitions of Jail and House of Correction 
being adhered to, the punishment of imprisonment 
may be apportioned with the greatest nicety, either 
by the statute, or at the discretion of the judge, if 
the law chooses to give him that discretion. There 
will be — 

Imprisonment for different degress of time. 

Imprisonment solitary, or in company, or in 
darkness. 

In jails without labour. 

In houses of correction with labour. 

Imprisonment with diet on bread and water. 

Imprisonment with common prison diet. 

Imprisonment with best prison diet. 

Imprisonment with free diet. 
Every sentence of the judge should state diet, as 
well as light or darkness, time, place, solitude, society, 
labour or ease ; ahd we are strongly of opinion, that 
the punishment in prisons shoidd be sharp and short. 
We would, in most cases, give as much of solitary 
confinement as would not injure men's minds, and as 
much bread and water diet as would not injure their 
bodies. A return to prison should be contemplated 
with horror — horror, not excited by the ancient filth, 
disease, and extortion of jails ; but by calm, well-re- 
gulated, weU-watched austerity — by the gloom and 
sadness wisely and intentionally thrown over such an 
abode. Six weeks of such sort of imprisonment would 
be much more efficacious than as many months of jolly 
company and veal cutlets. 



108 



WORKS OF THE REV. SIDNEY SMITH. 



It appears by the Times newspaper of the 24th 
of June, 1821, that two persons, a man and his wife, 
were committed at the Surrey Sessions for three 
years. If this county jail is bad, to three years of 
idleness and good living — if it is a manufacturing jail, 
to three years of regular labour, moderate living, and 
accumulated gains. They are committed principally 
for a warning to others, partly for their own srood. 
Would not these ends have been much more effectu- 
ally answered, if they had been committed, for nine 
months, to solitary cells, upon bread and water ; the 
first and last month in dark cells ? If this is too se- 
vere, then lessen the duration still more, and give 
them more light days and fewer dark ones ; but we 
are convinced the whole good sought may be better 
obtained in much shorter periods than are now resort- 
ed to. 

For the purpose of making jails disagreeable, the 
prisoners should remain perfectly alone all night, if it 
is not thought proper to render their confinement en- 
tirely solitary during the whole period of their im- 
prisonment. Prisoners dislike this— and therefore 
it should be done ; it would make their residence in 
jails more disagreeable, and render them unwilling to 
return there. At present, eight or ten women sleep 
in a room with a good fire, pass the night in sound 
sleep or pleasant conversation ; and this is called con- 
finement in a prison. A prison is a place where men, 
after trial and sentence, should be made unhappy by 
public lawful enactments, not so severe as to injure 
the soundness of mind or body. If this is not done, 
prisons are a mere invitation to the lower classes to 
wade, through felony and larceny, to better accom- 
modations than they can procure at home. And here, 
as it appears to us, is the mistake of the many excel- 
lent men who busy themselves (and wisely and hu- 
manely busy themselves) about prisons. Their first 
object seems to be the reformation of the prisoners, 
not the reformation of the public ; whereas the first 
object should be, the discomfort and discontent of 
their prisoners ; that they should become a warning, 
feel unhappy, and resolve never to act so again as to 
put themselves in the same predicament ; and then as 
much reformation as is compatible with this the better. 
If a man says to himself, this prison is a comfortable 
place, While he says to the chaplain or the visitor that 
he will come there no more, we confess we have no 
great confidence in his public declaration ; but if he 
says, < this is a place of misery and sorrow, you shall 
not catch me here again,' there is reason to believe he 
will be as good as his word ; and he then becomes 
(which is of much more consequence than his own 
reformation) a warning to others. Hence it is we 
object to that spectacle of order and decorum — car- 
penters iu one shop, tailors in another, weavers in a 
third, sitting down to a meal by ring of bell, and re- 
ceiving a regular portion of their earnings. We are 
afraid it is better than real life on the other side of the 
wall, or so very little worse that nobody will have any 
fear to encounter it. In Bury jail, which is consider- 
ed as a pattern jail, the prisoners under a sentence of 
confinement are allowed to spend their weekly earn- 
ings (two, three, and four shillings per week) in fish, 
tobacco, and vegetables ; so states the jailer in his 
examination before the House of Commons — and we 
have no doubt it is well meant ; but is it punishment ? 
We were more struck, in reading the evidence of the 
jail commitree before the House of Commons, with 
the opinions of the jailer of the Devizes jail, and with 
the practice of the magistrates who superintend it.* 

'Mr. T. Brutton, Governor of the Gaol at Devizes. — Does 
this confinement in solitude make prisoners more adverse 
to return to prison ? I think it does. — Does it make a strong 
impression upon them? I have no doubt of it. — Does it 
make them more obedient and orderly while in gaol ? I 
have no doubt it does.— Do you consider it the most effectu- 
al punishment you can make use of ? I do. — Do you 
think it has a greater effect upon the minds of prisoners 
than any apprehensions of personal punishment ? I have 
no doubt of it.— Have you any dark cells for the punish- 

* The Winchester and Devizes jails seem to us to be con- 
ducted upon better principles than any other, though even 
thesfc are by no means what jails should be. 



ment of refractory prisoners ? I have. — Do you find it 
necessary occasionally to use them ? Very seldom. — Have 
you, in any instance, been obliged to use the dark cell, in 
the case of the same prisoner, twice ? Only on one occa- 
sion, I think. — What length of time is necessary to confine 
a refractory prisoner to bring him to his senses ? Less than 
one day.— Do you think it essential, for the purpose of 
keeping up the discipline of the prison, that you should 
have it in your power to have recourse to the punishment 
of dark cells ? I do ; I consider punishment in a dark cell 
for one day, has a greater effect upon a prisoner than to 
keep him on bread and water for a month.' — Evidence be- 
fore the Committee of the House of Commons in 1819, p 359. 

The evidence of the governor of Gloucester jail is to 
the same effeet. 

' Mr. Thomas Cunningham, Keeper of the Gloucester 
Gaol. — Do you attribute the want of those certificates en- 
tirely to the neglect of enforcing the means of solitary con- 
finement ? I do most certainly. Sometimes, where a cer- 
tificate has not been granted, and a prisoner has brought a 
certificate of good behaviour for one year, Sir George and 
the committee ordered one pound or a guinea from the 
charity. — Does that arise from your apprehension that the 
prisoners have not been equally reformed, or only from the 
want of the means of ascertaining such reformation ? It is 
for want of not knowing ; and we cannot ascertain it, from 
their working in numbers. — They may be reformed ? Yes, 
but we have not the means or ascertaining it. There is one 
thing I do which is not provided for by the rules, and 
which is the only thing in which I deviate from the rules. 
When a man is committed for a month, I never give him 
any work; he sits in solitude, and walks in the yard by him- 
self for air ; he has no other food but his bread and water, 
except twice a week a pint of peas soup. I never knew an 
instance of a man coming in a second time, who had been 
committed for a month. I have done that for these seven- 
teen or eighteen years. — What has been the result ? They 
dread so much coming in again. If a man is committed 
for six weeks, we give him work. — Do you apprehend that 
solitary confinement for a month, without employment, is 
the most beneficial means of working reform ? I conceive 
it is. — Can it operate as the means of reform, any more 
than it operates as a system of punishment ? It is only for 
small offences they commit for a month. — Would not the 
same effect be produced by corporal punishment ? Corpo- 
ral punishment may be absolutely necessary sometimes ; 
but I do not think corporal punishment would reform them 
so much as solitary confinement. — Would. not severe cor- 
poral punishment have the same effect? No, it would 
harden them more than anything else. — Do you think ben- 
efit is derived from the opportunity of reflection afforded 
by solitary confinement? Yes — And very low diet also ? 
Yes.' — Evidence before the Committee of the House of Com- 
mons in 1819, p. 391. 

We must quote also the the evidence of the gover- 
nor of Horsley jail. 

' Mr. William Stokes, Governor of the House of Correc- 
tion at Horsley. — Do you observe any difference in the conduct 
of prisoners who are employed, and those who have no em- 
ployment ? Yes, a good deal ; I look upon it, from what 
judgment I can form, and I have been a long while in it, that 
to take a prisoner and discipline him according to the rules as 
the law allows, and if he have no work, that that man goes 
through more punishment in one month, than a man who is 
employed and receives a portion of his labour three months ; 
but still I should like to have employment, because a great 
number of times I took men away who have been in the habit 
of earning sixpence a-week to buy a loaf, and put them in soli- 
tary confinement : and the punishment is a great deal more 
without work. — Which of the prisoners, those that have been 
employed, or those unemployed, do you think would go out of 
the prison the better men t I think, that let me have a prison- 
er, and I never treat any one with severity, any further than 
that they should be obedient, and to let them see that I will do 
my duty, I have reason to believe, that, if a prisoner is Commit- 
ted under my care, or any other man's care, to a house of cor- 
rection, and he has to go under the discipline of the law, if he 
is in for the value of a month or six weeks, that a man is in a 
great deal better state than though he stays for six mouths ; he 
gets hardened by being in so long, from one month to another. 
— You are speaking now of solitude without labour; do you 
think he would go out better if he had been employed during 
the month you speak of? No, nor half; because I never task 
those people, in order that they should not say I force them to 
do more than they are able, that they should not slight it ; for 
if they perforin anytliing in the bounds of reason, I never find 
fault with them. The prisoner who is employed, his time 
passes smooth and comlortable, and he has a proportion of his 
earnings, and he can buy additional diet; but if he has no 
labour, and kept under the discipline of the prison, it is u 
tight piece of punishment to go through.— Which of the two 



STATE OF PRISONS. 



109 



should you think most likely to return immediately to habits 
of k;/our on their own account ? The dispositions of all men 
are pot alike ; but my opinion is this, if they are kept and disci- 
plined according to the rules of the prison, and have no labour, 
that one month will do more than six ; I am certain, that a 
man who is kept here without labour once, will not be very 
ready to come here again.' — Evidence before the Committee of 
the House of Commons, pp. 398, 399. 

Mr. Gumey and Mr. Buxton both lay a great stress 
upon the quiet and content of prisoners, upon their 
subordination and the absence of all plans of escape ; 
but, where the happiness of prisoners is so much con- 
sulted, we should be much more ajtprehensive of a 
conspiracy to break into, than to break out of, prison. 
The mob outside may, indeed, envy the wicked ones 
within ; but the felon who has' left, perhaps, a scold- 
ing wife, a battered cottage, and six starving children, 
has no disposition to escape from regularity, sufficient 
food, employment which saves him money, warmth, 
ventilation, cleanliness, and civil treatment. These 
symptoms, upon which these respectable and excellent 
men lay so much stress, are by no means proofs to us 
that prisons are placed upon the best possible footing. 

The governor of Bury jail, as well as Mr. Gumey, 
insist much upon the few prisoners who return to the 
jail a second time, the manufacturing skill which they 
acquire there, and the complete reformation of man- 
ners, for which the prisoner has afterwards thanked 
him the governor. But this is not the real criterion 
of the excellence of a jail, nor the principal reason 
why jails were instituted. The great point is, not the 
average recurrence of the same prisoners ; but the 
paucity or frequency of commitments, upon the whole. 
You may make a jail such an admirable place of edu- 
cation, that it may cease to be infamous to go there. 
Mr. Holford tells us (and a very curious anecdote it 
is), that parents actually accuse their children falsely 
of crimes, in order to get them into the Philanthropic 
Charity ! and that it is consequently a rule with the 
governors of that Charity never to receive a child up- 
on the accusation of the parents alone. But it is quite 
obvious what the next step will be, if the parents 
cannot get their children in by fibbing. They will 
take good care that the child is really qualified lor the 
Philanthropic, by impelling him to those crimes which 
are the passport to so good an education. 

' If, on the contrary, the offender is to be punished simply 
by being placed in a prison, where he is to be well lodged, 
well clothed, and well fed, to be instructed in reading and 
writing, to receive a moral and religious education, and to be 
brought up to a trade ; and if this prison is to be within the 
reach of the parents, so that they may occasionally visit their 
child, and have the satisfaction of knowing, from time to time, 
that all these advantages are conferred upon him, and that he 
is exposed to no hardships, although the confinement and the 
discipline of the prison may be irksome to the boy; yet the 
parents may be apt to congratulate themselves on having got 
him off their hands into so good a berth, and may be considered 
by other parents as having drawn a prize in the lottery of 
human life by their son's conviction. This reasoning is not 
theoretical, but is founded in some degree upon experience. 
Those who have been in the habit of attending the committee 
of the Philanthropic Society know, that parents have often ac- 
cused their children of crimes falsely, or have exaggerated 
their real offences, for the sake of inducing that society to 
take them ; and so frequent has been this practice, that it is a 
rule with those who manage that institution, never to receive 
an object upon the representation of its parents, unless sup- 
ported by other strong testimony.' — Holford, pp. 44,45. 

It is quite obvious that, if men were to appear again, 
six months after they were hanged, handsomer, richer, 
and more plump than before execution, the gallows 
would cease to be an object of terror. But here are 
men who come out of jail, and say, a Look at us, — 
we can read and write, we can make baskets and 
shoes, and we went in ignorant of every thing : and 
we have learnt to do without strong liquors, and have 
no longer any objection to work ; and we did work in 
the jail, and have saved money, and here it is." 
What is there of terror and detriment in all this? and 
how are crimes to be lessened if they are thus re- 
warded? Of schools there cannot be too many. Pe- 
nitentiaries, in the hands of wise men, may be ren- 
dered excellent institutions ; but a prison must be a 
prison— a place of sorrow and wailing ; which should. 



be entered with horror, and quitted with earnest reso- 
lution never to return to such misery ; with that deep 
impression, in short, of the evil which breaks out into 
perpetual warning and exhortation to others. This 
great point effected, all other reformation must do the 
greatest good. 

There are some very sensible observations upon this 
point in Mr. Holford's book, who upon the whole has, 
we think, best treated the subject of prisons, and best 
understands them. 

' In former times, men were deterred from pursuing the road 
that led to a prison, by the apprehension of encountering there 
disease and hunger, of being loaded with heavy irons, and of 
remaining without clothes to cover them, or a bed to lie on; 
we have done no more than what justice required in relieving 
the inmates of a prison from these hardships ; but there is no 
reason that they should be freed from the fear of all other suf- 
ferings and privations. And I hope that those whose duty it is 
to take up the consideration of these subjects, will see, that in 
Penitentiaries, offenders should be subjected to separate con- 
finement, accompanied by such work as may be found consis- 
tent with that system of imprisonment; that in jails or houses 
of correction, they should perform that kind of labour which 
the law has enjoined; and that, in prisons of both descriptions, 
instead of being allowed to cater for themselyes, they should 
be sustained by such food as the rules and regulations of the 
establishment should have provided for them; in short, that 
prisons should be considered as places of punishment, and not 
as scenes of cheerful industry, where a compromise must be 
made with the prisoner's appetite to make him do the common 
work of a journeyman or manufacturer, and the labours of 
the spinning-wheel and the loom must be alleviated by indul- 
gence.'* 

This is good sound sense ; and it is a pity that it is 
preceded by the usual nonsense about t the tide of blas- 
phemy and sedition? If Mr. Holford is an observer of 
tides and currents, whence comes it that he observes 
only those which set one way ? Whence comes it 
that he says nothing of the tides of canting and hypo- 
crisy, which are flowing with such rapidity ? — of ab- 
ject political baseness and sycophancy — of the dispo- 
sition so prevalent among Englishmen, to sell their 
conscience and their country to the Marquis of Lon- 
donderry for a living for the second son — or a silk gown 
for the nephew — or for a frigate for my brother the 



* ' That I am guilty of no exaggeration in thus describing a 
prison conducted upon the principles now coming int^fashion, 
will be evident to any person who will turn to the latter part 
of the article, "Penitentiary, Millbank," in Mr. Buxton's 
Book on Prisons. He there states what passed in conversa- 
tion between himself and the governor of Bury jail, (which 
jail, by the bye, he praises as one of the three best prisons he 
has ever seen, and strongly recommends to our imitation at 
Millbank). Having observed, that the governor of Bury jail 
had mentioned his having counted 34 spinning-wheels in full 
activity when he left that jail at 5 o'clock in the morning on 
the preceding day, Mr. Buxton proceeds as follows : — " After 
he had seen the Millbank Penitentiary, I asked him what 
would be the consequence, if the regulations there used were 
adopted by him?" " The consequence would be," he replied, 
" that every wheel would be stopped." Mr. Buxton then adds, 
"I would not be considered as supposing that the prisoners 
will altogether refuse to work at Millbank — they will work 
during the stated hours, but the present incentive being want- 
ing, the labour will, I apprehend, be languid and desultory." 
I shall not, on my part, undertake to say that they will do as 
much work as will be done in those prisons in which work is 
the primary object ; but, besides the encouragement of the 
portion of earnings laid up for them, they know that diligence 
is among the qualities that will recommend them to the mercy 
of the crown, and that the want of if is, by the rules and regu- 
lations of the prison, an offence to be punished. The governor 
of Bury jail, who is a very intelligent man, must have spoken 
hastily, in his eagerness to support his own system, and did 
not, I conceive, give himself credit for as much power and au- 
thority in his prison as he really possesses. It is not to be 
wondered at, that the keepers of prisons should like the new 
system: there is less trouble in the care of a manufactory than 
in that of a jail ; but I am surprised to find that so much reli- 
ance is placed in argument on the declaration of some of these 
officers, that the prisoners are quieter where their work is en- 
couraged, by allowing them to spend a portion of their earn- 
ings. It may naturally be expected, that offenders will be 
least discontented, and consequently least turbulent, where 
their punishment is lightest, or where, to use Mr. Buxton's own 
words, " by making labour productive of comfort or conven 
ience, you do much towards rendering it agreeable ;" but 
must be permitted to doubt, whether these are the prisons of 
which men will live in most dead.'— Holford, pp. 7B— 80 



110 



WORKS OF THE REV. SIDNEY SMITH. 



captain ? How comes our loyal careerist to forget all 
these sorts of tides? 

There is a great confusion, as the law now stands, 
in the government of jails. The justices are empow- 
ered, by several statutes, to make subordinate regula- 
tions for the government of the jails ; and the sheriff 
supersedes those regulations. Their respective juris- 
dictions and powers should be clearly arranged. 

The female prisoners should be under the care of a 
matron, with proper assistants. Where this is not 
the case, the feriiale part of the prison is often a mere 
brothel for the turnkeys. Can any thing be so repug- 
nant to all ideas of reformation, as a male turnkey 
visiting a solitary female prisoner ? Surely, women 
can take care of women as effectually as men can take 
care of men ; or, at least, women can do so properly, 
assisted by men. This want of a matron is a very 
scandalous and immoral neglect in any prison system. 

The presence of female visitors, and instructors for 
the women, is so obviously advantageous and proper, 
that the offer of forming such an institution must be 
gladly and thankfully received by any body of magis- 
trates. That they should feel any jealousy of such 
interference, is too absurd a supposition to be made or 
agreed upon. Such interference may not effect all 
that zealous people suppose it will effect ; but, if it 
does any good, it had better be. 

Irons should never be put upon prisoners before 
trial; after trial, we cannot object to the humiliation 
and disgrace which irons and a particoloured prison 
dress occasion. Let them be a part of solitary con- 
finement, and let the words s Solitary Confinement,' 
in the sentence, imply permission to use them. The 
judge then knows what he inflicts. 

We object to the office of prison inspector, for rea- 
sons so very obvious, that it is scarcely necessary to 
enumerate them. The prison inspector would, of 
course, have a good salary; that in England is never 
omitted. It is equally matter of course that he would 
be taken from among treasury retainers ; and that he 
never would look at a prison. Every sort of attention 
should be paid to the religious instruction of these 
nnhappy people ; but the poor chaplain should be 
paid a little better ; — every possible duty is expected 
from him — and he has one hundred per annum. 

Whatever money is given to prisoners, should be 
lodged with the governor for their benefit, to be ap- 
plied as the visiting magistrates point out — no other 
donations should be allowed or accepted. 

If voluntary work before trial, or compulsory work 
after trial, is the system of a prison, there should be 
a task-master ; and it should be remembered, that the 
principal object is not profit. 

Wardsmen, selected in each yard among the best 
of the prisoners, are very serviceable. If prisoners 
work, they should work in silence. At all times, the 
restrictions upon seeing friends should be very severe ; 
and no food should be sent from friends. 

Our general system then is — that a prison should be 
a place of real punishment ; but of known, enacted, 
measurable, and measured punishment. A prisoner 
(not for assault, or refusing to pay parish dues, but a 
bad felonious prisoner) , should pass a part of his three 
months in complete darkness ; the rest in complete 
solitude, perhaps in complete idleness, (for solitary 
idleness leads to repentance, idleness in company to 
vice). He should be exempted from cold, be kept 
perfectly clean, have food sufficient to prevent hunger 
or illness, wear the prison dress and moderate irons, 
have no communication with any body but the officers 
of the prison and the magistrates, and remain other- 
wise in the most perfect solitude. We strongly sus- 
pect this is the way in which a bad man is to be made 
afraid of prisons ; nor do we think that he would be 
less inclined to receive moral and religious instruction, 
than any one of seven or eight carpenters in jail, 
working at a common bench, receiving a part of their 
earnings, and allowed to purchase with them the deli- 
cacies of the season. If this system is not resorted to 
the next best system is severe work, ordinary diet, 
no indulgences, and as much seclusion and solitude as 
are compatible with work ; — always remarking, that 
perfect sanity of mind and body are to be preserved. 



To this system of severity in jails there is but one 
objection. The present duration of punishments was 
calculated for prisons conducted upon very different 
principles ; — and if the discipline of prisons was ren- 
dered more strict, we are not sure that the duration of 
imprisonment would then be quite atrocious and dis- 
proportioned. There is a very great disposition, both 
in judges and magistrates to increase the duration of 
imprisonment ; aid if that is done, it will be dreadful 
cruelty to increase the bitterness as well as the time. 
We should think, for instance, six months' solitary 
imprisonment to be a punishment of dreadful severity ; 
but we find, from the House of Commons' report, that 
prisoners are sometimes committed by county magi- 
strates for two years* of solitary confinement. And 
so it may be doubted, whether it is not better to wrap 
up the rod in flannel, and make it a plaything, as it 
really now is, than to show how it may be wielded 
with effectual severity. For the pupil, instead of giv- 
ing one or two stripes, will whip his patient to death. 
But if this abuse were guarded against, the real way 
to improve would be, now we have made our prisons 
healthy and airy, to make them odious and austere — 
engines of punishment, and objects of terror. 

In this age of charity and of prison improvement, 
there is one aid to prisoners which appears to be 
wholly overlooked ; and that is, the means of regula- 
ting their defence, and providing them witnesses for 
their trial. A man is tried for murder, or for house- 
breaking, or robbery, without a single shilling in his 
pocket. The nonsensical and capricious institutions 
of the English law prevent him from engaging counsel 
to speak in his defence, if he had the wealth of Croesus ; 
but he has no money to employ even an attorney, or 
to procure a single witness, or to take out a subpse- 
na. The judge, we are told, is his counsel ; — this is 
sufficiently absurd ; but it is not pretended that the 
judge is his witness. He solemnly declares that he 
has three or four witnesses who could give a com- 
pletely different colour to the transaction ; but they 
are sixty or seventy miles distant, working for their 
daily bread, and have no money for such a journey, 
nor for the expense of a residence of some days in 
an assize town. They do not know even the time 
of the assize, nor the modes of tendering their evi- 
dence if they should come. When everything is so 
well marshalled against him on the opposite side, 
it would be singular if an innocent man, with such 
an absence of all means of defending himself, should 
not occasionally be hanged or transported: and ac- 
cordingly we believe that such things have happened.! 
Let any man, immediately previous to the assizes vi- 
sit the prisoners for trial, and see the many wretches 
who are to answer to the most serious accusations, 
without one penny to defend themselves. If it ap- 
peared probable, upon inquiry, that these poor crea- 
tures had important evidence which they could not 
bring into court for want of money, would it not be a 
wise application of compassionate funds, to give them 
this fair chance of establishing their innocence ? It 
seems to us no bad finale of the pious labours of those 
who guard the poor from ill treatment during their 
imprisonment, to take care that they are not unjustly 
hanged at the expiration of the term. 



* House of Commons' Report, 355. 

t From the Cromwell Advertiser it appears, that John 
Brien, alias Captain Wheeler, was found guilty of murder at 
the late assizes for the county of Waterford. Previous to his 
execution he made the following confession : — 

' I now again most solemnly aver, in the presence of that 
God by whom 1 will soon be judged, and who sees the secrets 
of my heart, that only three, viz. Morgan Brien, Patrick 
Brien, and my unfortunate self, committed the horrible crimes 
of murder and burning at Ballygarron, and the four unfortu- 
nate men who have before suffered for them, were not in the 
smallest degree accessary to them. I have been the cause for 
which they have innocently suffered death. I have contracted 
a death of justice with them — and the only and least restitu 
tion I can make them is, thus publicly, solemnly, and with 
death befor my eyes, to acqu.t their memory of any guilt in 
the crimes for which I deservedly suffer! ! ! '—Philanthropist 
No. 6. 208. 

Pereunt et imputantur. 



PRISONS. 



Ill 



PRISONS. (Edinburgh Review, 1822.) 

1. The Third Report of the Committee of the Society for tlie 
Improvement of Prison Discipline, and for the Reformation 
of Juvenile Offenders. London, 1821. 

3. Remarks upon Prison Discipline, fyc, ifC, in a Letter ad- 
dressed to the Lord Lieutenant and Magistrates of the 
County of Essex. By C. C. Western, Esq., M. P. London, 
1821. 

There never was a society calculated, upon the 
whole, to do more good than the Society for the Im- 
provement of Prison Discipline ; and, hitherto, it has 
been conducted with equal energy and prudence. If 
now, or hereafter, therefore, we make any criticisms 
on their proceedings, these must not be ascribed to 
any deficiency of good will or respect. We may dif- 
fer from the society in the means — our ends, we are 
proud to say, are the same. 

In the improvement of prisons, they consider the 
small number of recommitments as the great test of 
amelioration. Upon this subject we have ventured to 
differ from them in a late number ; and we see no rea- 
son to alter our opinion. It is a mistake, and a very 
serious and fundamental mistake, to suppose that the 
principal object in jails is the reformation of the of- 
fender. The principal object undoubtedly is, to pre- 
vent the repetition of the offence by the punishment 
of the offender ; and, therefore, it is quite possible to 
conceive that the offender himself may be so kindly, 
gently, and agreeably led to reformation, by the ef- 
forts of good and amiable persons, that the effect of 
the punishment may be destroyed, at the same time 
that the punished may be improved. A prison may 
lose its terror and discredit, though the prisoner may 
return from it a better scholar, a better artificer, and 
a better man. The real and only test, in short, of a 
good prison system is, the diminution of offences by 
the terror of the punishment. If it can be shown 
that, in proportion as attention and expense have been 
employed upon the improvement of prisons, the num- 
ber of commitments has been diminished, — this in- 
deed would be a convincing proof that such care and 
attention were well employed. But the very reverse 
is the case ; the number of commitments within these 
last ten years having nearly doubled all over Eng- 
land. 

The following are stated to be the committals in 
Norfolk county gaol. From 1796 to 1815, the number 
averaged about 80. 



In 1816 it was 134 




1817 - 142 




1818 - 159 




1819 - 161 




1820 - 223.- 


-Report, p. 57 



In Staffordshire, the commitments have gradually 
increased from 195 in 1815, to 443 in 1820— though the 
jail has been built since Howard's time, at an expense 
of 30,000Z. — (Report, p. 67.) In Wiltshire, in a pri- 
son which has cost the county 40,000?., the commit- 
ments have increased from 207 in 1817, to 504 in 1821. 
Within this period, to the eternal scandal and disgrace 
of our laws, 378 persons have been committed for 
Game offences — constituting a sixth part of all the 
persons committed : — so much for what our old friend, 
Mr. Justice Best, would term the unspeakable advan- 
tages of country gentlemen residing upon their own 
property ! 

When the Committee was appointed in the county 
of Essex, in the year 1818, to talce into consideration 
the state of the jail and house of correction, they 
found that the number of prisoners annually commit- 
ted had increased, within the ten preceding years, 
from 559 to 1993 ; and there is little doubt (adds Mr. 
Western) of this portion being a tolerable specimen 
of the whole kingdom. We are far from attributing 
this increase solely to the imperfection of prison dis- 
cipline. Increase of population, new statutes, the ex- 
tension of the breed of pheasants, landed and mercan- 
tile distress, are very operative causes. But the in- 
crease of commitments is a stronger proof against the 
present state of prison discipline, than the decrease 
of recommitments is in its favour. We may possibly 



have made some progress in the art of teaching him 
wbo has done wrong, to do so no more ; but there is 
no proof that we have learnt the more important art, 
of deterring those from doing wrong who are doubt- 
ing whether they shall do it or not, and who, of 
course, will be principally guided in their decision by 
the sufferings of those who have previously yielded to 
temptation. 

There are some assertions in the Report of the So- 
ciety, to which we can hardly give credit, — not that 
we have the slightest suspicion of any intentional 
misrepresentation, but that we believe there must be 
some unintentional error. 

' The Ladies' Committees visiting Newgate and the Bo- 
rough Compter, have continued to devote themselves to the 
improvement of the female prisoners, in a spirit worthy of 
their enlightened zeal and Christian charity. The beneficial 
effects of their exertions have been evinced by the progressive 
decrease in the number of female prisoners recommitted, 
which lias diminished, since the visits of the ladies to Newgate, 
no less than 40 per cent.' 

That is, that Mrs. Fry and her friends have re- 
claimed forty women out of every hundred, who, but 
for them, would have reappeared in jails. Nobody 
admires and respects Mrs. Fry more than we do ; but 
this fact is scarcely credible : and, if accurate, ought, 
injustice to the reputation of the Society and its real 
interests, to have been thoroughly substantiated by 
names and documents. The ladies certainly lay claim 
to no such extraordinary success in their own Report 
quoted in the Appendix ; but speaking with becoming 
modesty and moderation of the result of their labours. 
The enemies of all these reforms accuse the reformers of 
enthusiasm and exaggeration. It is of the greates-t 
possible consequence, therefore, that their state- 
ments should be correct, and their views practical ; 
and that all strong assertions should be supported by 
strong documents. The English are a calm, reflect- 
ing people ; they will give time and money when they 
are convinced ; but they love dates, names, and certi- 
ficates. In the midst of the most heart-rending narra- 
tives, Bull requires the day of the month, the year of 
our Lord, the name of the parish, and the counter- 
sign of three or four respectable householders. Af- 
ter these affecting circumstances, he can no longer 
hold out ; but gives way to the kindness of his na- 
ture — puffs, blubbers, and subscribes ! 

A case is stated in the Hertford house of correction, 
which so much more resembles the sudden conver- 
sions of the Methodist Magazine, than the slow and 
uncertain process by which repentance is produced in 
real life, that we are a little surprised the society 
should have inserted it. 

' Two notorious poachers, no less than bad men, were com- 
mitted for three months, for not paying the penalty after con- 
viction, but who, in consequence of extreme contrition and 
good conduct, were, at the intercession of the clergyman of the 
parish, released before the expiration of tluir term of punish- 
ment. Upon leaving the house of correction, they declared 
that they had been completely brought to their senses — spoke 
with gratitude of the benefit they had derived from the advice 
of the chaplain, and promised, upon their return to the parish, 
that they would go to their minister, express their thanks for 
his interceding for them ; and moreover that they would for 
the future attend their duty regularly at church. It is plea- 
sing to add, that these promises have been faithfully fulfilled.' 
—App. to Third Report, pp. 29, 30. 

Such statements prove nothing, but that the clergy- 
man who makes them is an amiable man, and proba- 
bly a college tutor. Their introduction, however, in 
the Report of a society depending upon public opinion 
for success, is very detrimental. 

It is not fair to state the recommitments of one pri- 
son, and compare them with those of another, perhaps 
very differently circumstanced, — the recommitments, 
for instance, of a county jail, where offences are gene- 
rally of serious magnitude, with those of a borough, 
where the most trifling faults are punished. The im- 
portant thing would be, to give a table of recommit- 
ments, in the same prison, for a series of years, — the 
average of recommitments, for example, every five 
years in each prison for twenty years ^past. If the 
society can obtain this, it will tie a document of some 



112 



WORKS" OF THE REV SIDNEY SMITH. 



importance, (though of less perhaps than they would 
consider it to be). At present they tell us, that the 
average of recommitments in certain prisons is 3 per 
cent. : in certain other prisons 5 per cent. : but what 
were they twenty years ago in the same prison? — 
what were they five years ago ? If recommitments 
are to be the test, we must know whether these are 
becoming, in any given prison, more or less frequent, 
before we can determine whether that prison is better 
or worse governed than formerly. Recommitments 
will of course be more numerous where prisoners are 
received from large towns, and from the resorts of 
soldiers and sailors ; because it is in these situations 
that we may expect the most hardened offenders 
The different nature of the two soils which grow the 
crimes, must be considered before the produce gath 
sred into prisons can be justly compared. 

The quadruple column of the state of prisons for 
each year, is a very useful and important document 
and we hope, in time, the society will give us a gene- 
ral and particular table of commitments and recom 
mitments carried back for twenty or thirty years ; so 
that the table may contain (of Gloucester jail, for in- 
stance), 1st, the greatest number it can contain ; 2dly. 
the greatest number it did contain at any one period 
in each year ; 3dly, its classification ; 4thly, the great- 
est number committed in any given year ; 5thly, four 
averages of five years each, taken Irom the twenty 
years preceding, and stating the greatest number of 
commitments ; 6thly, the greatest number of recom- 
mitments in the year under view ; and four averages 
of recommitments, made in the same manner as trie 
average of the commitments ; and then totals at the 
bottom of the columns. Tables so constructed would 
throw great light upon the nature and efficacy of im- 
prisonment. 

We wish the society would pay a little more atten- 
tion to the question of solitary imprisonment, both in 
darkness and in light ; and to the extent to which it 
may be carried. Mr. Western has upon this subject 
some ingenious ideas. 

'It appears to me, that, if relieved from these impediments, 
and likewise from any idea of the necessity of making the 
labour of prisoners profitable, the detail of corrective prison 
discipline would not be difficult for anybody to chalk out. I 
would first premise, that the only punishment for refractory 
conduct, or any misbehaviour in the gaol, should, in my opinion, 
be solitary confinement; and that, instead of being in a dark 
hole, it should be in some part of the house where they could 
fully see the light of, day ; and I am not sure that it might not 
be desirable in some cases, if possible, that they should see the 
surrounding country and moving objects at a distance, and 
everything that man delights in, removed at the same time 
from any intercourse or word or look with any human being, 
and quite out of the reach of being themselves seen. I consi- 
der such confinement would be a punishment very severe, and 
calculated to produce a far better effect than darkness. All 
the feelings that are good in men would be much more likely 
to be kept alive ; the loss of liberty, and all the blessings of 
life which honesty will insure, more deeply to be felt. There 
would not be so much danger of any delinquent sinking into 
that state of sullen, insensible condition, of incorrigible obsti- 
nacy, which sometimes occurs. If he does under those circum- 
stances, we have a right to keep him out of the way of mis- 
chief, and let him there remain. But I believe such solitary 
confinements as I have described, with scanty fare, would very 
rarely fail of its effects.' — Western's Remarks, pp. 59, 60. 

There is a good deal in this ; it is well worth the 
trial ; and we hope the society will notice it in their 
next report. 

It is very difficult to hit upon degrees ; but we can- 
not help thinking the society lean too much to a sys- 
tem of indulgence and education in jails. We shall be 
very glad to see them more stern and Spartan in their 
discipline. They recommend work, and even hard 
work ; but they do not insist upon it, that the only 
work done in jails by felons should be hard, dull, ana 
uninteresting ; they do not protest against the conver- 
sion of jails into schools and manufactories. Look, 
for example, to l Preston house of correction.' 

'Preston house of correction is justly distinguished by the 
industry which prevails. Here an idle hand is rarely to be 
found. There were lately 150 looms in full employ, from each 
of which the average weekly earnings are 55. About 150 
pieces of cotton goods am worked off per week. A consider- 



able portion of the looms are of the prisoners' own manufacture. 
In one month, an experienced workman will be able to earn 
the cost of his gaol allowance of food. Weaving has these 
advantages over other prison labour : the noise of the shuttle 
prevents conversation, and the progress of the work constantly 
requires the eye. The accounts of this prison, contained in She. 
Appendix, deserve particular attention, as there appears to be 
a balance of clear profit to the county, from the labour of the 
prisoners, in the year, of 13981. 9s. Id. This sum we, earned 
by weaving and cleaning cotton only; the prisoners being be 
sides employed in tailoring, whitewashing, flagging, slating, 
painting, carpentering, and labourers' work, the earnings of 
which are not included in the above account.' — Third Report, 
pp. 21, 22. 

'At Worcester county gaol, the system of employment is 
admirable. Every article of dress worn by the prisoners is 
made from the raw material: sacking and bags are the only 
articles made for sale. — lb. p. 23. 

' In many prisons, the instruction of the prisoners in reading 
and writing has been attended with excellent effects. Schools 
have been formed at Bedford, Durham, Chelmsford, Win- 
chester, Hereford, Maidstone, Leicester house of correction, 
Shrewsbury, Warwick, Worcester, &c. Much valuable as- 
sistance has been derived in this department from the labours 
of respectable individuals, especially females, acting under 
the sanction of magistrates, and direction of the chaplain.' — 
lb. pp. 30, 31. 

We again enter our decided protest against these 
modes of occupation in prisons ; they are certainly 
better than mere idleness spent in society ; but they 
are not the kind* of occupations which render prisons 
terrible. We would banish all the looms of Preston 
jail, and substitute nothing but the tread- wheel, or the 
capstan, or some other species of labour where the la- 
bourer could not see the results of his toil, — where it 
was as monotonous, irksome, and dull as possible, — 
pulling and pushing, instead of reading and writing, — 
no share of the profits — not a single shilling. There 
should be no tea and sugar, — no assemblage of female 
felons round the washing-tub, — nothing but beating 
hemp, and pulling oakum, and pounding bricks, — no 
work but what was tedious, unusual, and unfeminine. 
Man, woman, boy and girl, should all leave the jail, 
unimpaired indeed in health, but heartily wearied of 
their residence ; and taught, by sad experience, to 
consider it as the greatest misfortune of their lives to 
return to it. We have the strongest belief that the 
present lenity of jails, the education carried on there 
— the cheerful assemblage of workmen — the indul- 
gence in diet — the shares of earnings enjoyed by pri- 
soners, are one great cause of the astonishingly rapid 
increase of commitments. 

Mr. Western, who entirely agrees with us upon these 
points, has the following judicious observations upon 
the severe system : — 

'It may be imagined by some persons, that the rules here 
prescribed, are too severe; but such treatment is, in my 
opinion, the tenderest mercy, compared with that indulgence 
which is so much in practice, and which directly tends to ruin, 
instead of saving its unfortunate victim. This severity it is, 
which in truth forms the sole effective means which imprison- 
ment gives ; only one mitigation therefore, if such it may be 
termed, can be admissible, and that is, simply to shorten the 
duration of the imprisonment. The sooner the prisoner comes 
out the better, if fully impressed with dread of what he has 
suffered, and communicates information to his friends what 
they may expect if they get there. It appears to me, indeed, 
that one great and primary object we ought to have in view 
is, generally to shorten the duration of imprisonment, at the 
same time we make it such a punishment as is likely to deter, 
correct, and reform ; shorten the duration of imprisonment 
before trial, which we are called upon, by every principle of 
moral and political justice, to do ; shorten also the duration of 
imprisonment after trial, by the means here described; and I 
am certain our prisons would soon lose, or rather would never 
see, half the number of their present inhabitants. The long 
duration of imprisonment, where the discipline is less severe, 
renders it perfectly familiar, and, in consequence, not only 
destitute of any useful influence, but obviously productive of 
the worst effects ; yet this is the present practice ; and I think, 
indeed, criminals are now sentenced to a longer period of con- 
finement than formerly. 

' The deprivation of liberty certainly is a punishment under 
any circumstances ; but the system generally pursued in our 
gaols might rather be considered as a palliative of that pun- 
ishment, than to make it effectual to any good purpose. An 
idle life, society unrestrained, with associates of similar habits, 
better fare and lodgings in many cases, and in few, if any, 
worse than falls to the lot of the hard working and industrious 



PRISONS 



113 



peasant ; and very often much better than the prisoners were 
in the enjoyment of before they were apprehended. 

'I do not know what could be devised more agreeable to 
all the different classes of offenders than this sort of treat- 
ment: the old hardened sinner, the juvenile offender, or the 
idle vagabond, who runs away and leaves a sick wife and 
family to be provided for by his parish, alike have little or 
no apprehension, at present, of any imprisonment to which 
they may be sentenced; and thus are the most effective 
means we possess to correct and reform rendered totally 
unavailable, and even perverted, to the more certain ruin 
of those who might be restored to society good and valuable 
members of it. 

'There are, it is true, various occupations now introduced 
into many prisons, but which, I confess, I think of very 
little use; drawing and preparing straws, platting, knitting, 
heading pins, &c., weaving, and working at a trade even, 
as it is generally carried on — prisoners coaled to the per- 
formance of it, the task easy, the reward immediate — afford 
rather the means of passing away the time agreeably. 
These occupations are indeed better than absolute idleness, 
notwithstanding that imprisonment may be rendered less 
irksome thereby. I am far from denying the advantage, 
still less would I be supposed to derogate from the merits of 
those who, with.every feeling of humanity, and with inde- 
fatigable pains, in many instances, have established such 
means of employment; and some of them for women, with 
washing, &c, amount to hard labour; but I contend that, 
for men, they are applicable only to a house of industry, 
and by no means suited to the corrective discipline which 
should be found in a prison Individuals are sent here to 
be punished, and for that sole purpose; in many cases for 
crimes which have induced the forfeiture of life : they are 
not sent to be educated, or apprenticed to a trade. The 
horrors of dungeon imprisonment, to the credit of the age, 
no longer exist. But if no cause of dread is substituted, by 
what indicatifin of common sense is it that we send crimi- 
nals there at all ? If prisons are to be made into places in 
which persons of both sexes and all ages may be well fed, 
clothed, lodged, educated, and taught a trade, where they 
may find pleasant society, and are required not to take heed 
for the morrow, the present inhabitants should be turned 
out, and the most deserving and industrious of our poorest 
fellow-subjects should be invited to take their place, which 
I have no doubt they would be eager to do.' — Western, 
p. 13—17. 

In these sentiments we most cordially agree. They 
are well worth the most serious attention of the so- 
ciety. 

The following is a sketch from Mr. Western's book 
of what a prison life should be. It is impossible to 
write with more good sense, and a more thorough 
knowledge of the subject. 

' The operations of the day should begin with the greatest 
punctuality at a given hour; and, as soon as the prisoners 
have risen from their beds, they should be, according to 
their several classes, marched to the workhouses, where 
they should be kept to hard labour two hours at least ; from 
thence they should be taken back to wash, shave, comb, 
and clean themselves ; thence to the chapel to hear a short 
prayer, or the governor or deputy should read to them in 
their respective day-rooms; and then their breakfast, which 
may, altogether, occupy an hour and a half or more. I 
have stated, in a former part of my letter, that the hours of 
meals and leisure should be in solitude, in the sleeping cells 
of the prison ; but I presume, for the moment, this may 
not always be practicable. I will therefore consider the 
case as if the classes assembled at meal-times in the different 
day-rooms. After breakfast they should return to hard 
labour for three or four hours, and then take another hour 
for dinner; labour after dinner two or three hours, and 
their supper given them to eat in solitude in their sleeping 
cells. 

'This marching backwards and forwards to chapel and 
mill-house, &c, may appear objectionable, but it has not 
been so represented to me in the prisons where it actually 
now takes place ; and it is, to my apprehension, materially 
useful in many respects. The object is to keep the prisoners 
in a state of constant motion, so that there shall be no 
lounging time or loitering, which is always favourable to 
mischief or cabal. For the same reason it'is I propose two 
hours' labour the moment they are up, and before washing, 
&c, that there may be no time lost, and that they may be- 
gin the day by a portion of labour, which will tend to keep 
them quiet and obedient the remainder of it. Each interval 
for meal, thus occurring between labour hours, has also a 
tendency to render the mischief of intercourse less pro- 
bable, and at the same time the evening association, which 
is most to be apprehended in this respect, is entirely cut off. 
The frequent moving of the prisoners from place to place 
keeps the governor and sub-officers of the prison in a simi- 
lar state of activity and attention, which is likewise of 
advantage, though their numbers should be such as to pre- 



vent their duty becoming too arduous or irksome. Their 
situation is not pleasant, and their responsibility is great. 
An able and attentive governor, who executes all his ardu- 
ous duties with unremitting zeal and fidelity, is a most 
valuable public servant, and entitled to the greatest respect. 
He must be a man of no ordinary capacity, with a liberal 
and comprehensive mind, possessing a control over his own 
passions, firm, and undaunted, a character that commands 
from those under him, instinctively, as it were, respect and 
regard. In vain are our buddings, and rules, and regula 
tions, if the choice of the governor is not made an object 
of primary and mo»t solicitous attention and consideration. 
'It does not appear to me necessary for the prisoners to 
have more than three hours leisure, inclusive of meal-times ; 
and I am convinced the close of the day must be in solitude. 
Eight or ten hours will have passed in company with their 
fellow prisoners of the same class (for I am presuming that 
a separate compartment of the workhouse will be allotted 
to each) where, though they cannot associate to enjoy so 
ciety as they would wish, no gloom of solitude can oppress 
them: there is more danger even then of too close an in- 
tercourse and conversation, though a ready cure is in that 
case to be found by a wheel put in motion, the noise of 
which speedily overcomes the voice. Some time after 
Saturday night should be allowed to them, more particularly 
to cleanse themselves and their clothes, and they should 
have a bath, cold or warm, if necessary ; and on the Sun- 
day they should be dressed in their best clothes, and the day 
should be spent wholly in the chapel, the cell, and the air- 
ing-ground; the latter in presence of a day-watchman, as I 
have described to be in practice at Warwick. I say nothing 
about teaching to read, write, work, &c. &c. ; any propor- 
tion of time necessary for any useful purpose may be spar- 
ed from the hours of labour or of rest, according to circum- 
stances ; but I do not place any reliance upon improvement 
in any branch of education : they would not, indeed, be 
there long enough. All I want them to learn is, that there 
exists the means of punishment for crime, and be fully im- 
pressed with dread of repetition of what they have under- 
gone; and a short time will suffice for that purpose. Now, 
if each successive day is spent in this manner, can it be 
doubted that the frequent commission of crime would be 
checked, and more done to deter, correct, and reform, than 
could be accomplished by any other punishment ! A pe- 
riod of such discipline, longer or shorter, according to the 
nature of the offence, would surely be sufficient for any vi- 
olation of the law short of wiurder, or that description of 
outrage which is likely to lead on to the perpetration of it. 
This sort of treatment is not to be overcome : it cannot be 
braved, or laughed at, or disregarded by any force of ani- 
mal spirits, however strong or vigorous of mind or body 
the individual may be. The dull, unvarying course of hard 
labour, with hard fare and seclusion, must in time become 
so painfully irksome, and so wear and distress him, that he 
will inevitably, in the end, be subdued' — Western, p. 64 
—69. 

There is nothing in the Report of the Prison Society 
so good as this. 

The society very properly observe upon the badness 
of town jails, and the necessity for their suppression. 
Most towns cannot spare the funds necessary for build- 
ing a good jail. Shopkeepers cannot spare the time 
for its superintendence ; and bence it happens that 
town jails are almost always in a disgraceful state. — 
The society frequently allude to the diffusion of tracts. 
If education is to be continued in jails, and tracts are 
to be dispersed, we cannot help lamenting that the 
tracts, though full of good principles, are so intolera- 
bly stupid — and all apparently constructed upon the 
supposition, that a thief or a peccant ploughman are 
inferior in" common sense to a boy of five years old. — 
The story generally is, that a labourer with six chil- 
dren has nothing to live upon but mouldy bread and 
dirty water ; yet nothing can exceed his cheerfulness 
and content — no murmurs — no discontent ; of mutton 
he has scarcely heard — of bacon he never dreams : — 
furfurous bread and the water of the pool constitute 
his food, establish his felicity, and excite his warmest 
gratitude. The squire or parson of the parish always 
happens to be walking by, and overhears him praying 
for the king and the members for the county, and for 
all in authority ; and it generally ends with their of- 
fering him a shilling, which this excellent man de- 
clares he does not want, and will not accept ! These 
are the pamphlets which Goodies and Noodles are 
dispersing with unwearied diligence. It would be a 
great blessing if some genius would arise who had a 
talent of writing for the poor. He would be of more 
value than many poets living upon the banks of lakes 
— or even (though we think highly of ourselves) of 



114 



WORKS OF THE REV. SIDNEY SMITH. 



greater value than many reviewing men living in the 
garrets of the north. 

The society offer some comments upon the prison 
bill now pending, and which, unfortunately* for the 
cause of prison improvement, has been so long pending 
in the legislature. In the copy of this bill, as it stands 
at present, nothing is said of the limitation of num- 
bers in any particular class. We have seen forty 
felons of one class in one yard before trial. If this is 
to continue, all prison improvement is a mere mock- 
ery. Separate sleeping cells should be enacted posi- 
tively, and not in words, which leave this improve- 
ment optional. If any visiting justice dissents from 
the majority,! it should be lawful for him to give in a 
separate report upon the state of the prison and pris- 
oners to the judge or the quarter sessions. All such 
reports of any visiting magistrate or magistrates, not 
exceeding a certain length, should be published in the 
county papers. The chairman's report to the secreta- 
ry of state should be published in the same manner. — 
The great panacea is publicity; it is this which se- 
cures compliance with wise and just laws, more than 
all the penalties they contain for their own preserva- 
tion. 

We object to the reading and writing clause. A 
poor man, who is lucky enough to have his son com- 
mitted for a felony, educates him, under such a sys- 
tem, for nothing ; while the virtuous simpleton on the 
other side of the Avail is paying by the quarter for 
these attainments. He sees clergymen and ladies busy 
with the larcenous pupil 5 while the poor lad, who re- 
spects the eighth commandment, is consigned, in some 
dark alley, to the frowns and blows of a ragged peda- 
gogue. It would be the safest way, where a prisoner 
is kept upon bread and water alone, to enact that the 
allowance of bread should not be less than a pound and 
a half for men, and a pound for women and boys. We 
strongly recommend, as mentioned in a previous num- 
ber, that four sorts of diet should be enacted for every 
prison : 1st, Bread and water ; 2d, Better prison diet ; 
3d, Best prison diet ; 4th, Free diet — the second and 
third to be defined by the visiting magistrates. All 
sentences of imprisonment should state to which of 
these diets the prisoner is to be confined ; and all de- 
viation from it on the part of the prison officers should 
be punished with very severe penalties. The regula- 
tion of prison diet in a prison is a point of the very 
highest importance ; and to ask of visiting magistrates 
that they should doom to bread and water a prisoner, 
whom the law has left at liberty to purchase whatever 
he has the money to procure, is a degree of severity 
which it is hardly fair to expect from country gentle- 
men, and, if expected, those expectations will not be 
fulfilled. The whole system of diet, one of the main- 
springs of all prison discipline, will get out of order, if 
its arrangement is left to the interference of magis- 
trates, and not to the sentence of the judge. Free diet 
and bread diet need no interpretation ; and the jailer 
will take care to furnish the judge with the definitions 
of better prison diet and best prison diet. A knowl- 
edge of the diet prescribed in a jail is absolutely ne- 
cessary for the justice of the case. Diet differs so 
much in different prisons, that six weeks in one prison 
is as severe a punishment as three months in another. 
If any country gentleman, engaged in legislation for 
prisons, is inclined to undervalue the importance of 
these regulations, let him appeal to his own experi- 
ence, and remember, in the vacuity of the country, — 
how often he thinks of his dinner, and of what there 
will be for dinner ; and how much his amenity and 
courtesy for the evening depend upon the successful 
execution of this meal. But there is nobody so glut- 
tonous and sensual as a thief; and he will feel much 
more bitterly, fetters on his mouth than his heels. It 
sometimes happens that a gentleman is sentenced to 
imprisonment, for manslaughter in a duel, or for a 

* The county of York, with a prison under presentment, has 
been waiting nearly three years for this bill, in order to pro- 
ceed upon the improvement of their county jail. 

t It would be an entertaining change in human affairs to de- 
termine every thing by minorities. They are almost always 
m the right. 



libel. Are visiting justices to doom such a prisoner 
to bread and water, or are they to make an invidious 
distinction between him and the other prisoners ? The 
diet should be ordered by the judge, or it never will 
be well ordered — or ordered at all. 

The most extraordinary clause in the bill is the fol- 
lowing : — 

'And be it further enacted, that in case any criminal prison- 
er shall be guilty of any repeated offence against the rules of 
the prison, or shall be guilty of any greater offence which the 
jailer or keeper is not by this act empowered to punish, the 
said jailer or keeper shall report the same to the visiting 
justice, or one of them, for the time being; aud such justices, 
or one of them, shall have power to inquire upon oath, and de- 
termine concealing any such offence so reported to him or 
them, and shall order the offender to be punished, either by 
moderate whipping, repeated whippings, or by close confine- 
ment, for any term not exceeding .' — Act, p. 21. 

Upon this clause, any one justice may order repeated 
whippings for any offence greater than that which the 
jailer may punish. Our respect for the committee will 
only allow us to say, that we hope this clause will be 
reconsidered. We beg leave to add, that there should 
be a return to the principal secretary of state of re- 
commitments as well as commitments. 

It is no mean pleasure to see this attention to jail 
discipline travelling from England to the detestable 
and despotic governments of the continent, — to see the 
health and life of captives admitted to be of any im- 
portance, — to perceive that human creatures in dun- 
geons are of more consequence than rats and black 
beetles. All this is new — is some little gained upon 
tyranny ; and for it we are indebted to the labours of 
the Prison Society. Still the state of prisons, on ma- 
ny parts of the continent, is shocking beyond all 
description. 

It is a most inconceivable piece of cruelty and ab- 
surdity in the English law, that the prisoners coun- 
sel, when he is tried for any capital felony, is not al- 
lowed to speak for him ; and this we hope the new 
prison bill will correct. Nothing can be more ridicu- 
lous in point of reasoning, or more atrociously cruel 
and unjust in point of fact. Any number of counsel 
may be employed to take away the poor man's life. — 
They are at full liberty to talk as long as they like ; — 
but not a syllable is to be uttered in his defence — not 
a sentence to show why the prisoner is not to be hung. 
This practice is so utterly ridiculous to any body but 
lawyers (to whom nothing that is customary is ridic- 
ulous), that men not versant with courts of justice 
will not believe it. It is, indeed, so utterly inconsis- 
tent with the common cant of the humanity of the 
English law, that it is often considered to be the mis- 
take of the narrator, rather than the imperfection of 
the system. We must take this opportunity, there- 
fore, of making a few observations on this very strange 
and anomalous practice. 

The common argument used in its defence is that 
the judge is counsel for the prisoner. But the defen- 
ders in this piece of cruel and barbarous nonsense must 
first make their election, whether they consider the 
prisoner to be, by this arrangement, in a better, a 
worse, or an equally good situation as if his counsel 
were allowed to plead for him. If he is in a worse 
situation, why is he so pleased? Why is a man, in a 
solemn issue of life and death, deprived of any fair 
advantage which any suitor in any court of justice 
possesses ? This is a plea of guilty to the charge we 
make against the practice ; and its advocates, by such 
concession, are put out of court. But, if it is an ad- 
vantage, or no disadvantage, whence comes it that 
the choice of this advantage, in the greatest of all hu- 
man concerns, is not left to the party, or to his friends ? 
If the question concerns a footpath — or a fat ox — 
every man may tell his own story, or employ a barris- 
ter to tell it for him. The law leaves the litigant to 
decide on the method most conducive to his own in- 
terest. But, when the question is whether he is to 
live or die, it is at once decided for him that his coun- 
sel are to be dumb ! And yet, so ignorant are men of 
their own interests, that there is not a single man 
tried who would not think it a great privilege if 



PRISONS 



116 



counsel were allowed to speak in his favour, and 
who would not be supremely happy to lay aside the 
fancied advantage of their silence. And this is true 
not merely of ignorant men ; but there is not an Old 
Bailey barrister who would not rather employ another 
Old Bailey barrister to speak for him, than enjoy the 
advantage (as the phrase is) of having the judge for 
his counsel. But in what sense, after all, is the judge 
counsel for the prisoner? He states, in his summing 
up, facts as they have been delivered in evidence ; 
and he tells the jury upon what points they are to de- 
cide : he mentions what facts are in favour of the 
prisoner, and what bear against him ; and he leaves 
the decision to the jury. Does he do more than this 
in favour of the prisoner ? Does he misstate ? Does 
he mislead? Does he bring forward arguments on 
one side of the question, and omit equally important 
arguments on the other ? If so, he is indeed counsel 
for the prisoner ; but then who is judge ? Who takes 
care of the interests of the public ? But the truth is, 
he does no such thing ; he does merely what we have 
stated him to do ; and would he do less, could he do 
less, if the prisoner's counsel spoke for him? If an 
argument was just, or an inference legitimate, he 
would not omit the one, or refute the other, because 
they had been put or drawn in the speech of the pri- 
soner's counsel. He would be no more prejudiced 
against the defendant in a criminal than in a civil 
6uit. He would select from the speeches of both 
counsel all that could be fairly urgeu. for or against 
the defendant, and he would reply to their fallacious 
reasonings. The pure administration of justice re- 
quires of him, in either case, the san\e conduct. 
Whether the whole bar speak for the prisoner, or 
whether he was left to defend himself, what can the 
judge do, or what ought he to do, but to state to the 
jury the facts as they are given in evidence, and the 
impression these facts have made upon his own mind ? 
In the mean time, while the prisoner's counsel have 
been compelled to be silent, the accuser's, the oppo- 
sit3 party, have enjoyed an immense advantage. In 
considering what bears against the prisoner, the 
judge has heard, not only the suggestions of his own 
understanding, but he has been exposed to the able 
and artful reasoning of a practised advocate, who has 
been previously instructed in the case of which the 
judge never heard a syllable before he came into 
court. Suppose it to be a case depending upon cir- 
cumstantial evidence ; in how many new points of 
view may a man of genius have placed those circum- 
stances, which would not have occurred to the judge 
himself ! How many inferences may he have drawn, 
which would have been unnoticed, but. for the efforts 
of a man whose bread and fame depend upon his exer- 
tions, and who has purposely, and on contract, flung 
the whole force of his understanding into one scale ! — 
In the mean time, the prisoner can say nothing, for he 
has not the gift of learned speech ; his counsel can 
say nothing, though he has communicated with the 
prisoner, and could place the whole circumstances, — 
perhaps, in the fairest and clearest point of view for 
the accused party. By the courtesy of England this 
is called justice — we in the north cannot admit of the 
correctness of the appellation. 

It seems utterly to be forgotten, in estimating this 
practice, that two understandings are better than one. 
The judge must inevitably receive many new views 
against the prisoner by the speech of one counsel, and 
lose many views in favour of the prisoner by the si- 
lence of the other. We are not to suppose (like ladies 
going into court in an assize town) that the judge 
would have thought of every thing which the counsel 
against the prisoner has said, and which the counsel 
for the prisoner would have said. The judge, wigged 
and robed as he is, is often very inferior in acuteness 
to either of the persons who are pleading under him — 
a cold, slow, parchment and precedent man, without 
passions or praecordia, — perhaps a sturdy brawler for 
church and king, — or a quiet man of ordinary abilities, 
steadily, though perhaps conscientiously, following 
those in power through thick and thin — through right 
and wrong. Whence comes it that the method of get- 
ting at truth, which is so excellent on all common oc- 



casions, should be considered as so improper on the 
greatest of all occasions, where th« life of a man is 
concerned? If an acre of land is to be lost or won, 
one man says all that can be said on one side of the 
question — another on the other ; and the jury, aided 
by the impartiality of the judge, decide. The wit of 
man can devise no better method of disentangling dif- 
ficulty, exposing falsehood, and detecting truth. < 7 ell 
■me why I am hurried away to a premature death, and no 
man suffered to speak in my defence, when at this very 
moment, and in my hearing, all the eloquence of the bar, 
on the other side of your justice hall, is employed in de- 
fending a path or a hedge ? Is a foot of land dearer to 
any man than my life is to me ? The civil plaintiff has 
not trusted the smallest part of his fate or fortune to his 
own efforts ; and will you grant me no assistance of su- 
perior wisdom, who have suffered a long famine to pur- 
chase it — who am broken by prison — broken by chains — 
and so shamed by this dress of guilt, and abashed by the 
presence of my superiors, that I have no words which you 
could hear without derision — that I could not give way 
for a moment to the fulness and agitation of my rude 
heart without moving your contempt V So spoke a 
wretched creature to a judge in our hearing ! and what 
answer could be given, but i Jailer, take him away ? ' 

We are well aware that a great decency of language 
is observed by the counsel employed against the pri- 
soner, in consequence of the silence imposed upon the 
opposite counsel ; but then, though there is a decency, 
as far as concerns impassioned declamation, yet there 
is no restraint, and there can be no restraint, upon the 
reasoning poAvers of a counsellor. He may put toge- 
ther the circumstances of an imputed crime in the 
most able, artful, and ingenious manner, without the 
slightest vehemence or passion. We have no objec 
tion to this, if any counter statement were permitted. 
We want only fair play. Speech for both sides, or 
speech for none. The first would be the wiser sys- 
tem ; but the second would be clear from the intolera- 
ble cruelty of the present. We see no harm that 
would ensue if both advocates were to follow their own 
plan without restraint. But, if the feelings are to be 
excluded in all cases of this nature (which seems very 
absurd), then let the same restraint be exacted from 
both sides. It might very soon be established, as the 
etiquette of the bar, that the pleadings on both sides 
were expected to be calm, and to consist of reasoning 
upon the facts. In high treason, where the partiality 
of the judge and power of the court are suspected, this 
absurd incapacity of being heard by counsel is remo- 
ved. Nobody pretends to say, in such cases, that the 
judge would be counsel for the prisoner ; and yet, how 
many thousand cases are there in a free country 
which have nothing to do with high treason, and 
where the spirit of party, unknown to himself, may get 
possession of a judge ? Suppose any trial for murder 
to have taken place in the Manchester riots, — will any 
man say that the conduct of many judges on such a 
question ought not to have been watched with the 
most jealous circumspection? Would any prisoner — 
would any fair mediator between the prisoner and 
the public — be satisfied at such a period with the 
axiom that the judge is counsel for the prisoner ? We 
are not saying that there is no judge who might not be 
so trusted, but that all judges are not, at all times, to 
be so intrusted. We are not saying that any judge 
would wilfully do wrong ; but that many might be 
led to do wrong by passions and prejudices of which 
they were unconscious ; and that the rea] safeguard to 
the prisoner, the best, the only safeguard, is full liberty 
of speech for the counsel he has employed. 

What would be the discipline of that hospital where 
medical assistance was allowed in all trifling com- 
plaints, and withheld in every case of real danger? — 
where Bailey and Halford were lavished upon stomach- 
aches and refused in typhus fever ? where the dying 
patient beheld the greatest skill employed upon tri- 
fling evils of others, and was told, because his was a 
case of life and death, that the cook or the nurse was 
to be his physician ? 

Suppose so intolerable an abuse (as the Attorney 
and Solicitor General would term it) had been esta- 
blished, and that a law for its correction was now first 



116 



WORKS OF THE REV. SIDNEY SMITH. 



proposed, entitled an Act to prevent the Counsel for 
Prisoners from being heard in their Defence ! ! ! 

What evil would result from allowing counsel to be 
in defence of prisoners ? Would too many people be 
hung from losing that valuable counsellor, the judge ? 
or would too few people be hung ? or would things re- 
main much as they are at present ? We never could 
get the admirers of this practice to inform us what 
the results would be of deviating from it ; and we are 
the more particularly curious upon this point, because 
our practice is decidedly the reverse, and we find no 
other results from it than a fair administration of cri- 
minal justice. In all criminal cases that require the 
intervention of a jury in Scotland, a prisoner must 
have, 1st, a copy of the indictment, which must con- 
tain a minute specification of the offence charged ; 
2dly, a list of witnesses ; 3dly, a list of the assize ; 
and 4thly, in every question that occurs, and in all 
addresses to the jur}', the prisoner's counsel has the 
last word. Where is the boasted mercy of the English 
law after this ( 

The truth is, it proceeds from the error which, in 
all dark ages, pervades all codes of laws, of confound- 
ing the accused with the guilty. In the early part of 
our state trials, the prisoners were not allowed to 
briog evidence against the witnesses of the crown. 
For a long period after this, the witnesses of the priso- 
ners were not suffered to be examined upon oath. One 
piece of cruelty and folly has given way after another. 
Each has been defended by the Attorney and Solicitor 
General for the time, as absolutely necessary to the 
existence of the state, and the most perfect perform- 
ance of our illustrious ancestors. The last grand hope 
of every foolish person, is the silence of the prisoner's 
counsel. In the defence of this it will be seen what 
stupidity driven to despair can achieve. We beg par- 
don for this digression ; but flesh and blood cannot en- 
dure the nonsense of lawyers upon this subject. 

The Society have some very proper remarks upon 
the religious instructions of the chaplain — an appoint- 
ment of vast importance and utility; unfortunately 
very ill paid, and devolving entirely upon the lower 
clergy. It is said that the present Bishop of Glouces- 
ter, Dr. Ryder, goes into jails, and busies himself with 
the temporal wretchedness and the eternal welfare of 
the prisoners. If this is so, it does him great honour, 
and is a noble example to all ranks of clergy who are 
subject to him. Above all, do not let us omit the fol- 
lowing beautiful anecdote, while we are talking of 
good and pious men. 

' The Committee cannot refrain from extracting from the 
Report of the Paris Society, the interesting anecdote of the 
excellent Pere Joussony, who being sent, by the Consul at 
Algiers, to minister to the slaves, fixed his residence in their 
prison; and, during a period of thirty years, never quitted 
his post. Being compelled to repair to France, for a short 
period, he returned again to the prison, and at length re- 
signed his breath in the midst of those for whose interests he 
had laboured, and who were dearer to him than life.' — Re- 
port, p. 30. 

It seems to be a very necessary part of the prison 
system, that any poor person, when acquitted, should 
be passed to his parish ; and that all who are acquit- 
ted, should be immediately liberated. At present, a 
prisoner, after acquittal, is not liberated till the grand 
jury are dismissed,* in case (as it is said) any more 
bills should be preferred against him. This is really 
a considerable hardship ; and we do not see, upon the 
same principle, why the prisoner may not be detained 
for another assize. To justify such a practice, notice 
should, at all events, be given to the jailer of inten- 
tion to prefer other charges against him. To detain 
a man, who is acquitted of all of which he has been 
accused, and who is accused of nothing more, merely 
because he may be accused of something more, seems to 
be a great perversion of justice. The greatest of all 
prison improvements, however, would be, the delivery 
of jails four times in the year. It would save expen- 
ses ; render justice more terrible, by rendering it more 
Erompt ; facilitate classification, by lessening num- 
ers ; keep constantly alive, in the minds of wicked 

* This has since been done away with. 



men, the dread of the law ; and diminish the unjust 
sufferings of those who, after long imprisonment, are 
found innocent. 

< From documents,' says Mr. Western, < upon the table of 
the House of Commons in 1819, I drew out an account, 
which I have already adverted to in part, but which I shall 
restate here, as it places, in a strong point of view, the ex- 
tent of injustice, and inconsistency too, arising out of the 
present system. It appeared, that at the Maidstone Lent 
Assizes of that year there were one hundred and seventy- 
seven prisoners for trial ; of these, seventeen were in pris- 
on before the 1st of October, eighty-three before the 1st oi 
January, the shortest period of confinement before trial be- 
ing six months of the former, three months of the latter. 
Nothing can show us more plainly the injustice of such con- 
finement, than the known fact of six months' imprisonment 
being considered a sufficient punishment for half the felon- 
ies that are committed ; but the case is stronger, when we 
consider the number acquitted ; seventeen of the twenty- 
seven first mentioned were acquitted, nine of the seven- 
teen were discharged; not being prosecuted, or having no 
bill found against them. On the other side it appeared, that 
twenty-five convicted felons were sentenced to six months' 
imprisonment, or under, the longest period of whose con 
finement did not, therefore, exceed the shortest of the sev 
enteen acquitted, or that of the nine, against whom no 
charge was adduced ; there were three, who, after being 
about seven months in prison, were discharged, whilst va- 
rious convicted felons suffered six-sevenths only of the 
punishment, including the time before trial as well as after 
condemnation. By the returns from the Lent Assizes at 
Chelmsford, the same year, the cases were not less striking 
than those of Maidstone : the total number was one hun- 
dred and sixty-six ; of these, twenty-five were in prison be- 
fore the 1st of October, of whom eleven were acquitted, 
and of these eleven, six were discharged without any in- 
dictment preferred ; two were in prison eight months ; three, 
seven months and fifteen days ; three, six months and fif- 
teen days. On the other hand, sixteen convicted of felony 
were considered to be sufficiently punished by imprison- 
ment under six months. Upon the whole, it appeared that 
four hundred and five persons had been in the gaol before 
the 1st of < >ctober, whilst eight hundred convicted felons 
were sentenced to a lighter punishment, to a shorter dura- 
tion of imprisonment, than these four hundred and five had 
actually undergone. 

' It is a curious fact, that, upon an average, more than 
one-third of the total number committed for trial are ac- 
quitted. In the seven years ending 1819, seventy-two thou- 
sand two hundred and sixteen persons were committed ; of 
these, fourteen thousand two hundred and ninety-one were 
acquitted on trial, eleven thousand two hundred and nine- 
ty-four were discharged, there being no prosecutions, or no 
bills found against them. This large proportion of acquit- 
tals aggravates the evil and injustice of long confinement 
before trial ; but were it otherwise, what possible right can 
we have to detain a man in custody six months, upon any 
charge exhibited against him, before he is brought to trial : 
What excuse or palliation can be found for so barbarous a 
violation of all the principles of justice and humanity ? 
How contemptible it is, by way of defence, to talk of the in- 
expediency of increasing the number of Judges, the expense, 
inconvenience, trouble,&c. ! It is wrong to contend with 
such arguments against the unanswerable claims of justice, 
as it is only to admit they are entitled to weight. The fact 
is, we are so completely under the influence of habitual re- 
spect for established practice, that we do not stop to ques- 
tion the possibility of the existence of any serious defects in 
the administration of the law that can be capable of reme- 
dy. The public attention has never been earnestly and 
steadily fixed and devoted to the attainment of a better sys- 
tem.'— Western, pp. 80—83. 

The public cannot be too grateful to Mr. Western 
for his labours on this subject. We strongly recom- 
mend his Tract for general circulation. It is full of 
stout good sense, without one particle of nonsense or 
fanaticism ; — good English stuff, of the most improved 
and best sort. Lord Londonderry has assented to the 
measure; and his assent does him and the govern- 
ment very great credit. It is a measure of first-rate 
importance. The multiplicity of imprisonments is tru- 
ly awful. 

Within the distance of ten miles round London, 
thirty-one fairs are annually held, which continue 
eighty days within the space of seven months. The 
effect of these fairs, in filling the prisons of the metro- 
polis, it is easy to imagine ; and the topic is very 
wisely and properly brought forward by the Society. 

Nothing can be so absurd as the reasoning used 
about flash houses. They are suffered to exist, it 
seems, because it is easy to the officers of justice to 



PERSECUTING BISHOPS 



in 



find, in such places, the prisoners of whom they are 
in search J But the very place where the thief is 
found is most probably the place which made him a 
thief. If it facilitates the search, it creates the neces- 
sity for searching, and multiplies guilt while it pro- 
motes detection. Wherever thieves are known to 
haunt, that place should be instantly purged of 
thieves. 

We have pushed this article to a length which will 
prevent us from dwelling upon that part of the plan of 
the Prison Society which embraces the reformation of 
juvenile delinquents, of whom it is calculated, there 
are not less than 8000 in London who gain their live- 
lihood by thieving. To this subject we^nay perhaps 
refer in some future number. We must content our- 
selves at present with a glimpse at the youthful cri- 
minals of the metropolis. 

'Upon a late occasion (in company with Mr. Samuel Hoare, 
the chairman of the Society for the Reform of Juvenile Delin- 
quents), I visited, about midnight, many of those receptacles of 
thieves which abound in this metropolis. We selected the 
night of that day in which an execution had taken place ; and 
our object was to ascertain whether that terrible demonstra- 
tion of rigour could operate even a short suspension of iniqui- 
ty, and keep for a single night the votaries of crime from their 
accustomed orgies. In one room, I recollect, we found a large 
number of children, of both sexes, the oldest under eighteen 
years of age, and in the centre of these a man who had been 
described to me by the police as one of the largest sellers of 
forged bank-notes. At another part, we were shown a number 
of buildings, into which only children were allowed to enter, 
and in which, if you could obtain admission, which you cannot, 
you would see scenes of the most flagrant, the most public, and 
the most shocking debauchery. Have I not, then, a right to 
say, that you are growing crimes at a terrible rate, and produ- 
cing those miscreants who are to disturb the public peace, 
plunder *the public property, and to become the scourge and 
the disgrace of the country V — Buxton, pp. 66, 67. 

Houses dedicated to the debauchery of children, 
where it is impossible to enter ! ! ! Whence comes 
this impossibility ? 

To show that their labours are not needlessly conti- 
nued, the Society make the following statement of the 
present state of prisons : — 

' But although these considerations are highly encouraging, 
there is yet much to accomplish in this work of national im- 
provement. So extensive are the defects of classification, that 
in thirty gaols, constructed for the confinement of 2985 per- 
sons, there were, at one time in the last year, no fewer than 
5837 prisoners ; and the whole number imprisoned in those 
gaols during that period, amounted to 26,703. There are yet 
prisons where idleness and its attendant evils reign unre- 
strained — where the sexes are not separated — where all dis- 
tinctions of crime are confounded — where few can enter, if 
uncorrupted, without pollution ; and, if guilty, without incur- 
ring deeper stains of criminality. There are yet prisons which 
receive not the pious visits of a Christian minister — which the 
light of knowledge never enters — and where the truths and 
consolations of the Gospel are never heard. There are yet 
prisons where, for the security of the prisoners, measures are 
resorted to as revolting to British feeling as they arc repug- 
nant to the letter and spirit of English law.'— Report, pp. 
63, 64. 

With this statement we take our leave of the sub- 
ject of prisons, thoroughly convinced that, since the 
days of their cleanliness and salubrity, they have been 
so managed as to become the great school for crimes 
and wretchedness ; and I hat the public, though begin- 
ning to awake, are not yet sufficiently alarmed at it. 
Mrs. Fry is an amiable excellent woman, and ten 
thousand times better than the infamous neglect that 
preceded her; but hers is not the method to stop 
crimes. In prisons which are really meant to keep 
tne multitude in order, and to be a terror to evil doers, 
there must be no sharing of profits— no visiting of 
friends — no education but religious education — no free- 
dom of diet— no weavers' looms or carpenters' bench- 
es. There must be a great deal of solitude ; coarse 
food; a dress of shame; hard, incessant, irksome, 
eternal labour ; a planned and regulated and unrelent- 
ing exclusion of happiness and comfort. 



PERSECUTING BISHOPS. (Edinburgh Review, 
1822.) 

1. An Appeal to the Legislature and Public ; or, the Legality 
of the Eighty-seven Questions proposed by Dr. Herbert 
Marsh, the Bishop of Peterborough, to Candidates for Holy 
Orders, and for'Licenses, within that Diocese, considered 
2d Edition. London, Seely, 1821. 

2. A Speech, delivered in the House of Lords, on Friday, June 
7, 1822, by Herbert, Lord Bishop of Peterborough, on the 
Presentation of a Petition against his Examination Ques- 
tions ; with Explanatory Notes, a Supplement, and a Copy 
of the Questions. London, Rivington, 1822. 

3. The Wrongs of the Clergy of the Diocese of Peterborough 
stated and illustrated. By the Rev. T. S. Grimshawe, M. A., 
Rector of Burton, Northamptonshire 5 and Vicar of Bidden- 
ham, Bedfordshire. London, Seely, 1822. 

4. Episcopal Innovation : or, the Test of Modern Orthodoxy, 
in Eighty-seven Questions, imposed, as Articles of Faith, 
upon Candidates for Licenses and for Holy Orders, in the 
Diocese of Peterborough; with a distinct Answer to each 
Question, and General Reflections relative to their Illegal 
Structure and Pernicious Tendency. London, Seely, 1820. 

5. Official Correspondence between the Right Reverend Her- 
bert, Lord Bishop of Peterbor ough, and the Rev. John Green, 
respecting his Nomination to the Curacy of Blatherwycke, 
in the Diocese of Peterborough, and County of Northamp- 
ton : Also, between His Grace Charles, Lord Archbishop of 
Canterbury, and the Rev. Henry William Nevile, M. A., 
Rector of Blatherwycke, and of Cottesmore in the County of 
Rutland. 1821. 

It is a great point in any question to clear away en- 
cumbrances, and to make a naked circle about the 
object in dispute, so that there may be a clear view 
of it on every side. In pursuance of this disencum- 
bering process, we shall first acquit the bishop of all 
wrong intentions. He has a very bad opinion of the 
practical effects of high Calvinistic doctrines upon the 
common people ; and he thinks it his duty to exclude 
those clergymen who profess them from his diocese. 
There is no moral wrong in this. He has accordingly 
devised no fewer than eighty-seven interrogatories, by 
which he thinks he can detect the smallest taint of 
Calvinism that may lurk in the creed of the candidate ; 
and in this also, whatever we may think of his reason- 
ing, we suppose his purpose to be blameless. He be- 
lieves, finally, that he has legally the power so to in- 
terrogate and' exclude ; and in this perhaps he is not 
mistaken. His intentions, then, are good, and his 
conduct, perhaps, not amenable to the law. All this 
we admit in his favour ; but against him we must 
maintain, that his conduct upon the points in dispute 
has been singularly injudicious, extremely harsh, and, 
in its effects (though not in its intentions), very op- 
pressive and vexatious to the clergy. 

We have no sort of intention to avail ourselves of an 
anonymous publication to say unkind, uncivil, or dis- 
respectful things to a man of rank, learning, and char- 
acter — we hope to be guilty of no such impropriety ; — 
but Ave cannot believe we are doing wrong in ranging 
ourselves on the weaker side, in the cause of propriety 
and justice. The mitre protects its wearer from in- 
dignity ; but it does not secure impunity. 

It is a strong presumption that a man is wrong, — 
when all his friends, whose habits naturally lead them 
to coincide with him, think him wrong. If a man 
were to indulge in taking medicine till the apothecary, 
the druggist, and the physician, all called upon him to 
abandon his philo-cathartic propensities — if he were 
to gratify his convivial habits till the landlord demur- 
red and the waiter shook his head — we should natu- 
rally imagine that advice so wholly disinterested was 
not given before it was wanted, and that it merited 
some little attention and respect. Now, though the 
Bench of Bishops certainly love power, and love the 
church, as well as the Bishop of Peterborough, yet not 
one defended him — not one rose to say, ' I have done, 
or I would do the same thing.' It was impossible to 
be present at the last debate on this question, without 
perceiving that his lordship stood alone — and this in a 
very gregarious profession, that habitually combines 
and butts against an opponent with a very extended 
front. If a lawyer is wounded, the rest of the pro- 
fession pursue him, and put him to death. If a church- 
man is hurt, the others gather round for his protection 



118 



WORKS OF THE REV. SIDNEY SMITH. 



stamp with their feet, push with their horns, and de- 
molish the dissenter who did the mischief. 

The bishop has at least done a very unusual thing 
in his Eighty-seven Questions. The two archbishops, 
and we believe every other bishop, and all the Irish 
hierarchy, admit curates into their dioceses without 
any such precautions. The necessity of such severe 
and scrupulous inquisition, in short, has been apparent 
to nobody but the Bishop of Peterborough ; and the 
authorities by which he seeks to justify it are any 
thing but satisfactory. His lordship states, that forty 
years ago, he was himself examined by written inter- 
rogatories, and that he is not the only bishop who has 
done it ; but he mentions no names ; and it was hardly 
worth while to state such extremely slight precedents 
for so strong a deviation from the common practice of 
the church. 

The bishop who rejects a curate upon the Eighty- 
seven Questions is necessarily and inevitably opposed 
to the bishop who ordained him. The Bishop of 
Gloucester ordains a young man of twenty-three years 
oi' age, not thinking it necessary to put to him these 
interrogatories, or putting them perhaps, and approv- 
ing of answers diametrically opposite to those that 
are required by the Bishop of Peterborough. _ The 
young clergyman then comes to the last-mentioned 
bishop, and the bishop, after putting him to the ques- 
tion, says, " You are unfit for a clergyman,"— though, 
ten days before, the Bishop of Gloucester has made 
him one ! It is bad enough for ladies to pull caps, but 
still worse for bishops to pull mitres. Nothing can be 
more mischievous or indecent than such scenes ; and 
no man of common prudence, or knowledge of the 
world, but must see that they ought immediately to 
be put a stop to. If a man is a captain in the army in 
one part of England, he is a captain in all. The gen- 
eral who commands north of the Tweed does not say, 
You shall never appear in my district, or exercise the 
functions of an officer, if you do not answer eighty- 
seven questions on the art of war, according to my no- 
tions. The same officer who commands a ship of the 
line in the Mediterranean, is considered as equal to 
the same office in the North Seas. The sixth com- 
mandment is suspended, by one medical diploma,—' 
from the north of England to the south. But, by this 
new system of interrogation, a man may be admitted 
into orders at Bamet, rejected at Stevenage, re-admit- 
ted at Brogdcn, kicked out as a Calvinist at Witham 
Common, and hailed as an ardent Arminian on his ar- 
rival at York. 

It matters nothing to say that sacred things must not 
be compared with profane. In their importance, we 
allow, they cannot ; but in their order and discipline 
they may be so far compared as to say, that the dis- 
crepancy and contention which would be disgraceful 
and pernicious in worldly affairs, should, in common 
prudence, be avoided in the affairs of religion. Mr. 
Greenough has made a map of England, according to 
its geological varieties ;— blue for the chalk, green for 
the clay, red for the sand, and so forth. Under this 
system of Bishop Marsh, we must petition for the as- 
sistance of the geologist in the fabrication of an eccle- 
siastical map. All the Arminian districts must be 
purple. Green for one theological extremity— sky- 
blue for another — as many colours as there are bishops 
— as many shades of these colours as there are arch- 
deacons—a tailor's pattern card— the picture of va- 
nity, fashion, and caprice ! 

The bishop seems surprised at the resistance he 
meets with ; and yet, to what purpose has he read ec- 
clesiastical history, if he expects to meet with any 
thing but the most determined opposition ? Does he 
think that every sturdy supralapsarian bullock whom 
he tries to sacrifice to the genius of orthodoxy, will 
not kick, and push, and toss ; that he will not, if he 
can, shake the axe from his neck, and hurl his mitred 
butcher into the air ? His lordship has undertaken a 
task of which he little knows the labour or the end. 
We know these men fully as well as the bishop ; he 
has not a chance of success against them. If one mo- 
tion in Parliament will not do, they will have twenty. 
They will ravage, roar, and rush, till the very chap- 
lains, and the Masters and Misses Peterborough re- 



quest his lordship to desist. He is raising up a storm 
in the English church, of which he has not the slight- 
est conception ; and which will end, as it ought fo end 
in his lordship's disgrace and defeat. 

The longer we live, the more we are convinced of 
the justice of the old saying, that an ounce of mother 
wit is worth a pound of clergy • that discretion, gentle 
manners, common sense, and goodnature, are, in men 
of high ecclesiastical station, of far greater import- 
ance than the greatest skill in discriminating between 
sublapsarian and supralapsarian doctrines. Bishop 
Marsh should remember, that all men wearing the 
mitre work by character, as well as doctrine ; that a 
tender regard to men's rights and feelings, a desire to 
avoid sacred squabbles, a fondness for quiet, and an 
ardent wish to make every body happy, would be of 
far more value to the Church of England than all his 
learning and vigilance of inquisition. The Irish tithes 
will probably fall next session of Parliament ; the 
common people are regularly receding from the Church 
of England — baptizing, burying, and confirming for 
themselves. Under such circumstances, what would 
the worst enemy of the English church require ? — a 
bitter, bustling, theological bishop, accused by his 
clergy of tyranny and oppression — the cause of daily 
petitions and daily debates in the House of Commons 
— the idoneous vehicle of abuse against the Establish- 
ment — a stalking horse to bad men for the introduction 
of revolutionary opinions, mischievous ridicule, and 
irreligious feelings. Such will be the advantages which 
Bishop Marsh will secure for the English Establish- 
ment in the ensuing session. It is inconceivable how 
such a prelate shakes all the upper works of the 
church, and ripens it for dissolution and decay. Six 
such bishops, multiplied by eighty-seven, and # working 
with five hundred and twenty-two questions, would 
fetch every thing to the ground in less than six months. 
But what if it pleased Divine Providence to afflict 
every prelate with the spirit of putting eighty-seven 
queries, and the two archbishops with the spirit of put- 
ting twice as many, and the Bishop of Sodor and Man 
with the spirit of putting only forty-three queries ( — 
there would then be a grand total of two thousand 
three hundred and thirty-five interrogations flying 
about the English church ; and sorely vexed would the 
land be with Question and Answer. 

We will suppose this learned prelate, without mean- 
ness or undue regard to his worldly interests, to feel 
that fair desire of rising in his profession, which any 
man, in any profession, may feel without disgrace. 
Does he forget that his character in the ministerial 
circles will soon become that of a violent impractica- 
ble man — whom it is impossible to place in the high- 
est situations — who has been intrusted with too much 
already, and must be trusted with no more ? Minis- 
ters have something else to do Avith their time, and 
with the time of Parliament, than to waste them in 
debating squabbles between bishops and their clergy. 
They naturally wish, and, on the whole, reasonably 
expect, that every thing should go on silently and 
quietly in the church. They have no objection to a 
learned bishop ; but they deprecate one atom more 
of learning than is compatible with moderation, good 
sense, and the soundest discretion. It must be the 
grossest ignorance of the world to suppose, that the 
cabinet has any pleasure in watching Calvinists. 

The bishop not only puts the questions, but he actu- 
ally assigns the limits within which they are to be 
answered. Spaces are left in the paper of interroga- 
tions, to which limits the answer is to be confined ; — 
two inches to original sin ; an inch and a half to justi- 
fication ; three quarters to predestination ; and to free 
will only a quarter of an inch. But if his lordship 
gives them an inch thej r will take an ell. His lord- 
ship is himself a theological writer, and by no means 
remarkable for his conciseness. To deny space to his 
brother theologians, who are writing on the most diffi- 
cult subjects, not from choice, but necessity; not for 
fame, but for bread; and to award rejection as the 
penalty of prolixity, does appear to us no slight devi- 
ation from Christian gentleness. The tyranny of call- 
ing for such short answers is very strikingly pointed 
out in a letter from Mr. Thurtell to the Bishop of Pe- 



PERSECUTING BISHOPS. 



119 



terborough ; the style of which pleads, we think, very 
powerfully in favour of the writer. 

' Beccles, Suffolk, August 28tA, 1821. 
' My Lord, 

4 1 ought, in the first place, to apologize for delaying so long 
to answer your lordship's letter : but the difficulty in which I 
was involved, by receiving another copy of your lordship's 
Questions, with positive directions to give short answers, may 
be sufficient to account for that delay. 

• It is my sincere desire to meet your lordship's wishes, and 
to obey your lordship's directions in every particular; and 1 
would therefore immediately have returned answers, without 
any " restrictions or modifications," to the Questions which 
your lordship has thought fit to send me, if, in so doing, I could 
have discharged the obligations of my conscience, by showing 
what my opinions really are. But it appears to me, that the 
Questions proposed to me by your lordship are so constructed 
as to elicit only two sets of opinions ; and that by answering 
them in so concise a manner, I should be representing myself 
to your lordship as one who believes in either of two particu- 
lar creeds, to neither of which I do really subscribe. For in- 
stance, to answer Question I. chap. ii. in the manner your 
lordship desires, I am reduced to the alternative of declaring, 
either that "mankind are a mass of mere corruption," which 
expresses more than I intend, or of leaving room for the infer- 
ence, that they are only partially corrupt, which is opposed to 
the plainest declarations of the Homilies ; such as these, " Man 
is altogether spotted and defiled" (Horn, on Nat.), " without a 
spark of goodness in him" (Serm. on Mis. of Man, &c.) 

.' Again, by answering the Questions comprised in the chap- 
iter on " Free Will," according to your lordship's directions, I 
am compelled to acknowledge either that man has such a 
share in the work of his own salvation as to exclude the sole 
agency of God, or that he has no share whatsoever ; when the 
Homilies for Rogation Week and Whit-sunday positively de- 
clare, that God is the "only Worker," or, in other words, 
sole Agent ; and at the same time assign to man a certain 
share in the work of his own salvation. In short, I could, with 
your lordship's permission, point out twenty Questions, in- 
volving doctrines of the utmost importance, which I am una- 
ble to answer, so as to convey my real sentiments, without 
more room for explanation than the printed sheet affords. 

' In this view of the subject, therefore, and in the most delib- 
erate exercise of my judgment, I deem it indispensable to my 
acting with that candour and truth with which it is my wish 
and duty to act, and with which I cannot but believe your 
.ordship desires I should act, to state my opinions in that lan- 
guage which expresses them most fully, plainly and unreserv- 
edly. This I have endeavoured to do in the answers now in 
the possession of your lordship. If any further explanation be 
required, I am most willing to give it, even to a minuteness of 
opinion beyond what the Articles require. At the same time, 
I would humbly and respectfully appeal to your lordship's 
candour, whether it is not hard to demand my decided opinion 
upon points which have been the themes of volumes ; upon 
which the most pious and learned men of the church have con- 
scientiously differed; and upon which the Articles in the judg- 
ment of Bishop Burnet, have pronounced no definite sentence. 
To those Articles, my lord, I have already subscribed; and I 
am willing again to subscribe to every one of them, " in its 
literal and grammatical sense," according to his majesty's de- 
claration prefixed to them. 

' I hope, therefore, in consideration of the above statement, 
that your lordship will not compel me, by the conciseness of 
my answers, to assent to the doctrines which I do not believe, 
or to expose myself to inferences which do not fairly and 
legitimately follow from my opinions. 

' I am, my Lord, &c. &c' 

We are not much acquainted with the practices of 
courts of justice ; but, if we remember right, when a 
man is going to be hanged, the judge lets him make 
his defence in his own way, without complaining of 
its length. We should think a Christian bishop might 
be equally indulgent to a man who is going to be ruin- 
ed. "The answers are required to be clear, concise, 
and correct — short, plain, and positive. In other 
words, a poor curate, extremely agitated at the idea 
of losing his livelihood, is required to write with brev- 
ity and perspicuity on the following subjects : — Re- 
demption by Jesus Christ — Original Sin — Free Will — 
Justihcation — Justification in reference to its causes — 
Justification in reference to the time when it takes 
place — Everlasting salvation — Predestination — Regen- 
eration on the New Birth — Renovation, and the Holy 
Trinity. As a specimen of these questions, the an- 
swer to which is required to be so brief and clear, we 
shall insert the following quotation : — 



' Section II.— Of Justification, in reference to its cause. 

«1. Does not the eleventh Article declare, that we are "justi- 
fied by Faith only ?" 

< 2. Does not the expression " Faith only" derive additional 
strength from the negative expression in the same Arti- 
cle " and not for our own works?" 

' 3. Does not therefore the eleventh Article exclude good works 
from all share in the office of Justifying 1 Or can we so 
construe the term " Faith" in that Article, as to make it 
include good works ? 

* 4. Do not the twelfth and thirteenth Articles further exclude 
them, the one by asserting that good works follow after 
Justification, the other by maintaining that they cannot 
precede it ? 

'5. Can that, which never precedes an effect, be reckoned 
among the causes of that effect ? 

'■ 6. Can we then, consistently with our Articles, reckon the 
performance of good works among the causes of Justifi- 
cation, whatever qualifying epithet be used with the 
term cause ?' 

We entirely deny that the Calvinistical clergy are 
bad members of their profession. We maintain that 
as many instances of good, serious, and pious men — 
of persons zealously interesting themselves in the 
temporal and spiritual welfare of their parishioners 
are to be found among them, as among the clergy 
who put an opposite interpretation on the Articles. 
The Articles of Religion are older than Arminianism, 
eo nomine. The early reformers leant to Calvinism ; 
and would, to a man, have answered the bishop's 
questions in a way which would have induced him to 
refuse them ordination and curacies ; and those who 
drew up the Thirty-nine Articles, if they had not pru- 
dently avoided all precise interpretation of their creed 
on free-will, necessity, absolute decrees, original sin, 
reprobation and election, would have, in all proba- 
bility, given an interpretation of them like that which 
the bishop considers as a disqualification for holy 
orders. Laud's Lambeth Articles were illegal, mis- 
chievous, and are generally condemned. The Irish 
clergy, in 1641, drew up one hundred and four articles 
as the creed of their church ; and these are Calvinis- 
tic, and not Arminian. They were approved and 
signed by Usher, and never abjured by him ; though 
dropt as a test or qualification. Usher was promoted 
(even in the days of Arminianism) to bishoprics and 
archbishoprics — so little did a Calvinistic interpreta- 
tion of the Articles in a man's breast, or even an 
avowal of Calvinism, beyond what was required by 
the Articles, operate even then as a disqualification 
for the cure of souls, or of any other office in the 
church. Throughout Charles II. and William III.'s 
time, the best men and greatest names of the church 
not only allowed latitude in interpreting the Articles, 
but thought it would be wise to diminish their num- 
ber, and render them more lax than they are ; and be 
it observed, that these latitudinarians leant to Armi- 
nianism rather than to high Calvinism ; and thought, 
consequently, that the Articles, if objectionable at 
all, were exposed to the censure of being i too Calvin- 
istic,' rather than too Arminian. How preposterous, 
therefore, to twist them, and the subscription to them 
required by law, by the machinery of a long string of 
explanatory questions, into a barrier against Calvinists, 
and to give the Arminians a monopoly in the church ! 

Archbishop Wake, in 1716, after consulting all the 
bishops then attending Parliament, thought it incum- 
bent on him ' to employ the authority which the ecclesi- 
astical laws then in force, and the custom and laws of 
the realm vested in him,'' and taking care that < no un- 
worthy person might hereafter be admitted into the 
sacred ministry of the church ;' and he drew up twelve 
recommendations to the bishops of England, m which 
he earnestly exhorts them not to ordain persons of 
bad conduct or character, or incompetent learning ; 
but he does not require from the candidates for holy 
orders or preferment, any explanation whatever of the 
Articles which they had signed. 

The correspondence of the same eminent prelate 
with Professor Turretin, in 1718, and with Mr. Le 
Clerc and the pastors and piofessors of Geneva in 
1719, printed in London. 1782, recommends union 
among Protestants, and the omission of controverted 



ISO 



WORKS OF THE REV. SIDNEY SMITH. 



points in confessions of faith, as a means of obtaining 
that union ; and a constant reference to the practice 
of the Church of England is made in elucidation of the 
charity and wisdom of such policy. Speaking of men 
who act upon a contrary principle, he says, O quan- 
tum potuit insana (piXavTia ! 

These passages, we think, are conclusive evidence 
of the practice of the church till 1719. For Wake 
was not only at the time Archbishop of Canterbury, 
but both in his circular recommendations to the 
bishops of England, and in his correspondence with 
foreign churches, was acting in the capacity of metro- 
politan of the Anglican church. He, a man of pru- 
dence and learning, probably boasts to Protestant 
Europe, that his church does not exact, and that he 
de facto has never avowed, and never will, his opi- 
nions on those very points upon which Bishop Marsh 
obliges every poor curate to be explicit, upon pain of 
expulsion from the church. 

It is clear, then, the practice was, to extract sub- 
scription and nothing else, as the test of orthodoxy — 
to that Wake is an evidence. As far as he is autho- 
rity on a point of opinion, it is his conviction that his 
practice was wholesome, wise, and intended to pre- 
serve peace in the church ; that it would be wrong at 
least, if not illegal, to do otherwise ; and that the ob- 
servance of this forbearance is the only method of 
preventing schism. The Bishop of Peterborough, 
however, is of a different opinion ; he is so thoroughly 
convinced of the pernicious effects of Calvinistic doc- 
trines, that he does what no other bishop does, or 
ever did do, for their exclusion. This may be either 
wise or injudicious, but it is at least zealous and bold ; 
it is to encounter rebuke, and opposition, from a sense 
of duty. It is impossible to deny this merit to his 
lordship. And we have no doubt, that, in pursuance 
of the same theological gallantry, he is preparing a 
set of interrogatories for those clergymen who are 
presented to benefices in his diocese. The patron 
will have his action of Quare impedit, it is true ; and 
the judge and jury will decide whether the bishop has 
the right of interrogation at all; and whether Calvin- 
istical answers to his interrogatories disqualify any 
man from holding preferment in the Church of Eng- 
land. If either of these points are given against the 
Bishop of Peterborough, he is in honour and con- 
science bound to give up his examination of curates. 
If Calvinistic ministers are, in the estimation of the 
bishops, so dangerous as curates, they are of course 
much more dangerous as rectors and vicars. He has 
as much right to examine one as the other. Why 
then does he pass over the greater danger, and guard 
against the less? Why does he not show his zeal 
when he would run some risk, and where the excluded 
person (if excluded unjustly) could appeal to the laws 
of his country? If his conduct is just and right, has 
he any thing to fear from that appeal ? What should 
we say of a police officer who acted in ail cases of 
petty larceny, where no opposition was made, and let 
off all persons guilty of felony who threatened to 
knock him down ? If the bishop values his own cha- 
racter, he is bound to do less — or to do more. God 
send his choice may be right ! The law, as it stands 
at present, certainly affords very unequal protection 
to rector and curate ; but if the bishop will not act so 
as to improve the law, the law must be so changed as 
to improve the bishop ; an action of Quai-e imjyedit 
must be given to the curate also — and then the fury of 
interrogation will be calmed. 

We are aware that the Bishop of Peterborough, in 
his speech, disclaims the object of excluding the Calvi- 
nists by this system of interrogation. We shall take 
no other notice of his disavowal, than expressing our 
sincere regret that he ever made it ; but the question 
is not at all altered by the intention of the interrogator. 
Whether he aims at the Calvinists only, or includes 
them with other heterodox respondents — the fact is, 
they are included in the proscription, and excluded 
from the church. The practical effect of the practice 
being, that men are driven out of the church who have 
as much right to exercise the duties of clergymen as 
the bishop himself. If heterodox opinions are the 



great objects of the bishop's apprehensions, he has his 
ecclesiastical courts, where regular process may bring 
the offender to punishment, and from whence there is 
an appeal to higher courts. This would be the fair 
thing to do. The curate and the bishep would be 
brought into the light of day, and subjected to the 
wholesome restraint of public opinion. 

His lordship boasts that he has excluded only two 
curates. So the Emperor of Hayti boasted that he 
had only cut off two persons' heads for disagreeable 
behaviour at his table. In' spite of the paucity of the 
visitors executed, the example operated as a consider 
able impediment to conversation ; and the intensity of 
the punishment was found to be a full compensation for 
its rarity. How many persons have been deprived of 
curaci.s which they might have enjoyed but for the 
tenour of these interrogatories ? How many respecta 
ble clergymen have been deprived of the assistance ot 
curates connected with them by blood, friendship, or 
doctrine, and compelled to choose persons, for no other 
qualification than that they could pass through the eye 
of the bishop's needle? Violent measures are not to 
be judged of merely by the number of times they have 
been resorted to, but by the terror, misery, and re- 
straint which the severity is likely to' have produced. 

We never met with any style so entirely clear of all 
redundant and vicious ornament, as that which the 
ecclesiastical Lord of Peterborough has adopted to- 
wards his clergy. It in fact, may be all reduced to 
these few words — ' Reverend Sir, I shall do what I 
please. Peterborough.' — Even in the House of Lords, 
he speaks what we must call very plain language. 
Among other things, he says, that the allegations of 
the petitions are fahe. Now, as every bishop is, be- 
sides his other qualities, a gentleman ; and as the word 
false is used only by laymen, who mean to hazard 
their lives by the expression ; and as it cannot be sup- 
posed that foul language is ever used because it can be 
used with personal impunity, his lordship must, there- 
fore, be intended to mean not false, but mistaken — not 
a wilful deviation from truth, but an accidental and 
unintended departure from it. 

His lordship talks of the drudgery of wading through 
ten pages of answers to his eighty-seven questions. 
Who has occasioned this drudgery, but the person 
who means to be so much more active, useful, and im- 
portant, than all other bishops, by proposing questions 
which nobody has thought to be necessary but him- 
self? But to be intolerably strict and harsh to a poor 
curate, who is trying to earn a morsel of hard bread, 
and then to complain of the drudgery of reading his 
answers, is much like knocking a man down with a 
bludgeon, and then abusing him for splashing you with 
his blood, and pestering you with his groans. It is 
quite monstrous, that a man who inflicts eighty seven - 
new questions in theology upon his fellow-creatures, 
should talk of the drudgery of reading their answers. 

A curate — there is something which excites compas- 
sion in the very name of a curate ! ! ! How any man 
of purple, palaces, and preferment, can let himself 
loose against this poor workingman of God, we are at 
a loss to conceive, — a learned man in a hovel, with ser 
mons and saucepans, lexicons and bacon, Hebrew 
books and ragged children — good and patient — a com- 
forter and a preacher — the first and purest pauper in 
the hamlet, and yet showing, that, in the midst of his 
worldly misery, he has the heart of a gentleman, and 
the spirit of a Christian, and the kindness of a pastor • 
and this man, though he has exercised the duties of a 
clergyman for twenty years — though he has most am- 
ple testimonies of conduct from clergymen as respect- 
able as any bishop — though an archbishop add his 
name to the list of witnesses, is not good enough for 
Bishop Marsh ; but is pushed out in the street, with 
his wife and children, and his little furniture, to sur- 
render his honour, his faith, his* conscience, and his 
learning — or to starve ! 

An obvious objection to these innovations is, that 
there can be no end to them. Jf eighty-seven ques- 
tions are assumed to be necessary by one bishop, eight 
hundred may be considered as the minimum of inter- 
rogation by another. When once the ancient faith 



PERSECUTING BISHOPS. 



121 



jnarks of the church are lost sight of and despised, any- 
misled theologian may launch out on the boundless sea 
of polemical vexation. 

The Bishop of Peterborough is positve, that the Ar- 
il unian interpretation of the articles is the right inter- 
pretation, and that Calvinists should be excluded from 
it ; but the country gentlemen who are to hear these 
matters debated in the Lower House, are to remem- 
ber, that other bishops have written upon these points 
before the Bishop of Peterborough, and have arrived 
at conclusions diametrically opposite. When curates 
are excluded because their answers are Calvinistical, a 
careless layman might imagine that this interpreta- 
tion of the Articles had never been heard of before 
in the church — that it was a gross and palpable per- 
version of their sense, which had been scouted by all 
writers on church matters, from the day the Articles 
were promulgated, to this hour — that such an unheard 
of monster as a Calvinistical curate had never leaped 
over the pale before, and been detected browsing in 
the sacred pastures. 

The following is the testimony of Bishop Sher- 
lock : — 

'"The church has left a latitude of sense to prevent 
schisms and breaches upon every different opinion. It is 
evident the Church of England has so done in some articles, 
which are most liable to the hottest disputes ; which yet are 
penned with that temper as to be willingly subscribed by 
men of different apprehensions in those matters." — Sher- 
lock's Defence of Stilling fleet's Unreasonableness of Separa- 
tion. 

Bishop Cleaver, describing the difficulties attending 
so great an undertaking as the formation of a national 
creed, observes : — 

< " These difficulties, however, do not seem to have dis- 
couraged the great leaders in this work from forming a de- 
sign as wise as it was liberal, that of framing a confession, 
which, in the enumeration and method of its several arti- 
cles, should meet the approbation, and engage the consent, 
of the whole reformed world. 

< " If upon trial, it was found that a comprehension so ex- 
tensive could not be reduced to practice, still as large a com- 
prehension as could be contrived/within the narrower lim- 
its of the kingdom, became, for the same reasons which first 
suggested the idea, at once an object of prudence and duty, 
in the formation and government of the English church." 

' After dwelling on the means necessary to accomplish 
this object, the bishop proceeds to remark : — "Such evident- 
ly appears to have been the origin, and such the actual com- 
plexion of the confession comprised in the Articles of our 
church ; the true scope and design of which will not, I conceive, 
be correctly apprehended in onu other view than that of one 
drawn up and adjusted with anffintention to comprehend the 
assent of all, rather than to exclude that of any who concurred 
in the necessity of a reformation. 

' " The means of comprehension intended were, not any 
general ambiguity or equivocation of terms, but a prudent 
forbearance in all parties not to insist on the full extent of 
their ophiions in matters not essential or fundamental ; and in 
all cases to wave, as much as possible, tenets which might divide, 
where they wish to unite.'"— Remarks on the Design and 
Formation of the Articles of the Church of England, by 
William, Lord Bishop of Bangor, 1802.'— pp.53— 25. 

We wall finish with Bishop Horsley. 

« It has been the fashion of late to talk about Arminianism 
as the system of the Church of England, and of Calvinism 
as something opposite to it, to which the church is hostile. 
That I may not be misunderstood in what I have stated, or 
may have occasion further to say upon this subject, I must 
here declare, that I use the words Arminianism and Calvin- 
ism in that restricted sense in which they are now general- 
ly taken, to denote the doctrinal part of each system, as un- 
connected with the principles either of Arminians or Calvin- 
ists upon church discipline and church government. This 
being premised, I assert, what I often have before asserted, 
and by God's grace I will persist in the assertion to my dy- 
ing day, til at so far is it from the truth that the Church of 
England is decidedly Armenian, and hostile to Calvinism, 
that the truth is this, that upon the principal points in dispute 
between the Arminians and the Calvinists upon all the points 
of doctrine, characteristic of the two sects, the Church of Eng- 
land maintains an absolute neutrality ; her articles explicitly 
assert nothing but what is believed both by Arminians and by 
Calvinists. The Calvinists indeed hold some opinions re- 
lative to the same points, which the Church of England has 
not gone the length of asserting in her Articles ; but neither 
ha* she gone the length of explicitly contradicting *hose 



opinions ; insomuch that there is nothing to hinder the Ar- 
minian and the highest supralapsarian Calvinist from walking 
together in the Church of England and Ireland as friends and 
brothers, if they both approve the discipline of the church, and 
both are willing to submit to it. Her discipline has been ap- 
proved ; it has been submitted to ; it has been in former 
times most ably and zealously defended by the highest su- 
pralapsarian Calvinists. Such was the great Usher ; such 
wasWhitgift; such were many more, burning and shining 
lights of our church in her early days (when first she shook 
off the Papal tyranny), long since gone to the resting place 
of the spirits of the just.— Bishop Horsley's Charges, p. 216.' 
pp. 25, 26. 

So that these unhappy curates are turned out of their 
bread for an exposition of the Articles which such men 
as Sherlock, Cleaver, and Horsley think may be fairly 
given of their meaning. We do not quote their au- 
thority to show that the right interpretation is decid- 
ed, but that it is doubtful — that there is a balance of 
authorities — that the opinion which Bishop Marsh has 
punished with poverty and degradation, has been con- 
sidered to be legitimate, by men at least as wise and 
learned as himself. In fact, it is to us perfectly clear, 
that the Articles were originally framed to prevent 
the very practices which Bishop Marsh has used for 
their protection — they were purposely so worded, that 
Arminians and Calvinists could sign them without 
blame. They were intended to combine both these 
descriptions of Protestants, and were meant principally 
for a bulwark against the Catholics. 

'Thus,' says Bishop Burnet, ' was the doctrine of the 
church cast into a short and plain form ; in which they took 
care both to establish the positive articles of religion, and 
to cut off the errors formerly introduced in the time of po- 
pery, or of late broached by the Anabaptists and enthusi- 
asts of Germany; avoiding the niceties of schoolmen, or the 
peremptoriness of the writers of controversy ; leaving matters 
that are more justly controvertible, a liberty to divines to fol- 
low their private opinions, without thereby disturbing the peace 
of the church:— History of the Reformation, Book I. part ii. 
p. 168, folio edition. 

The next authority is that of Fuller. 

« In the convocation now sitting, wherein Alexander No- 
wel, Dean of St. Paul's, was prolocutor, the ninth and-thir- 
ty Articles were composed. For the main they agree with 
those set forth in the reign or King Edward the Sixth, 
though in some particulars allowing more liberty to dissent- 
ing judgements. For instance, in this King's Articles it is 
said, that it is to be believed that Christ went down to hell 
(to preach to the spirits there) ; which last clause is left out 
in these Articles, and men left to a latitude concerning the 
cause, time, and manner of his descent. 

< Hence some have unjustly taxed the composers for too 
much favour extended in their large expressions, clean 
through the contexture of these Articles, which should harve 
tied men's consciences up closer, in more strict and partic- 
ularizing propositions, which indeed proceeded from their 
commendable moderation. Children's clothes ought to be 
made of the biggest, because afterwards their bodies will 
grow up to their garments. Thus the Articles of this Eng- 
lish Protestant Church, in the infancy thereof, they thought 
good to draw up in general terms, foreseeing that posterity 
would grow up to fill the same : I mean these holy men 
did prudently prediscover, that difference in judgements 
would unavoidably happen in the church, and were loath to 
unchurch any, and drive them off from an ecclesiastical commu- 
munion,for such petty differences, which made them pen the 
Articles in comprehensive words, to take in all who, differing 
in the branches, meet in the root of the same religion. 

' Indeed most of them had formerly been sufferers them- 
selves, and cannot be said, in compiling these Articles (an 
acceptable service, no doubt,) to offer to God -what cost 
them nothing, some having paid imprisonment, others ex- 
ile, all losses in their estates, for this their experimental 
knowledge in religion, which made them the more merciful 
and tender in stating those points, seeing such who them- 
selves have been most patient in bearing, will be most pit- 
iful in burdening the consciences of others.' — See Fuller's 
Church History, book ix. p. 72, folio edit. 

But this generous and pacific spirit gives no room 
for the display of zeal and theological learning. The 
gate of admission has been left too widely open. I 
may as well be without power at all, if I cannot force 
my opinions upon other people. What was purposely 
left indefinite, I must make definite and exclusive. 
Questions of contention and difference must be laid 
before the servants of the church, and nothing 13' 



122 



WORKS OF THE REV. SIDNEY SMITH. 



neutrality in theological metaphysics allowed to the 
ministers of the Gospel. I come not to bring peace, &c. 

The bishop, however, seems to be quite satisfied 
with himself, when he states, that he has a right to do 
what he has done— just as if a man's character with 
his fellow-creatures depended upon legal rights alone, 
and not upon a discreet exercise of those rights. A 
man may persevere in doing what he has a right to do, 
till the chancellor shuts him up in Bedlam, or till the 
mob pelt him as he passes. It must be presumed, 
that all men whom the law has invested with rights, 
nature has invested with common sense, to use those 
rights. For these reasons, children have no rights till 
they have gained common sense, and old men have no 
rights after they lose their common sense. All men 
are at all times accountable to their fellow-crea- 
tures for the discreet exercise of every right they pos- 
sess. 

Prelates are fond of talking of my see, my clergy, my 
diocese, as if these things belonged to them, as their 
pigs and dogs belonged to them. They forget that the 
clergy, the diocese, and the bishops themselves, all ex- 
ist only for the public good ; that the public are«a third, 
and principal party in the whole concern. It is not 
simply the tormenting Bishop versus the tormented 
Curate, but the public against the system of tormenting; 
as tending to bring scandal upon religion and religious 
men. By the late alteration of the laws, the labour- 
ers in the vineyard are given up to the power of the 
inspectors of the vineyard. If he has the meanness 
and malice to do so, an inspector may worry and 
plague to death any labourer against whom he may 
have conceived an antipathy. As often as such cases 
are detected, we believe they will meet, in either 
House of Parliament, with the severest reprehension. 
The noblemen and gentlemen of England will never 
allow their parish clergy to be treated with cruelty, 
injustice, and caprice, by men who were parish cler- 
gymen themselves yesterday, and who were trusted 
with power for very different purposes. 

The Bishop of Peterborough complains of the inso- 
lence of the answers made to him. This is certainly 
not true of Mr. Grimshawe, Mr. Neville, or of the au- 
thor of the Appeal. They have answered his lordship 
with great manliness, but with perfect respect. Does 
the bishop expect that humble men, as learned as 
himself, are to be driven from their houses and homes 
by his new theology, and then to send him letters of 
thanks for the kicks and cuffs he has bestowed upon 
them? Men of very small incomes, be it known to 
his lordship, have very often very acute feelings ; and 
a curate trod on feels a pang as great as when a bishop 
is refuted. 

We shall now give a specimen of some answers, 
which, we believe, would exclude a curate from the 
diocess of Peterborough, and contrast these answers 
with the articles of the church to which they refer. 
The 9th Article of the Church of England is upon Ori- 
ginal Sin. Upon this point his lordship puts the fol- 
lowing question: — 

'Did the Fall of Adam produce such an effect on his posterity, 
that mankind became thereby a mass of mere corruption, or of 
absolute and entire depravity ? Or is the effect only such, that 
we are very far gone from original righteousness, and of our 
own nature inclined to evil? ' 
Excluding Answer. The Ninth Article. 

' The fall of Adam ' Original sin standeth not in the fol- 

produced such an lowing of Adam (as the Pelagians do 

effect on his poste- vainly talk) ; but it is the fault or cor- 

rity, that mankind ruption of the nature of every man, that 

became thereby a naturally is engendered of the offspring 

mass of corruption, of Adam, whereby man is very far gone 

or of absolute and from original righteousness, and is of his 

entire depravity.' own nature inclined to evil, so that the 

flesh always lusteth contrary to the 

spirit; and therefore in every person 

born into the world, it deserveth God's 

wrath and damnation.' 

The 9th Question, Cap. 3d, on Free Will, is as fol- 
lows : — Is it not contrary to Scripture to say, that man 
has share in the work of his salvation ? 



Excluding Answer. Tenth Article. 

' It is quite agree- ' The condition of man after the fall of 

able to Scripture to Adam is suth, , that he cannot turn and 

say, that man has no prepare himself, by his own natural 

share in the work of strength and good works, to faith, and 

his own salvation.' calling upon God. Wherefore, we have 

no power to do good works pleasant and 

acceptable to God, without the grace of 

God by Christ preventing us, that we 

may have a good will, and working with 

us when we have that good will.' 

On Redemption, his lordship has the following ques- 
tion, Cap. 1st, Question 1st : — Did Christ die for all 
men, or did he die only for a chosen few ? 



Excluding Answer. 
'Christdidnotdie 
for all men, but only 
for a chosen few.' 



Part of Article Seventeenth. 
' Predestination to life is the everlast- 
ing purpose of God, whereby (before the 
foundations of the world were laid) he 
hath constantly decreed by his counsel, 
secret to us, to deliver from curse and 
damnation those whom he hath chosen 
in Christ out of mankind, and to bring 
them by Christ unto everlasting salva- 
tion, as vessels made to honour.' 
Now, whether these answers are right or wrong, we 
do not presume to decide ; but we cannot help saying, 
there appears to be some little colour in the language 
of the Articles for the errors of the respondent. It 
does not appear at first sight to be such a deviation 
from the plain, literal, and grammatical sense of the 
Articles, as to merit rapid and ignominious ejectment 
from the bosom of the church. 

Now we have done with the bishop. We give him 
all he asks as to his legal right ; and only contend, 
that he is acting a very indiscreet and injudicious 
part — fatal to his quiet, fatal to his reputation as a 
man of sense, blamed by ministers, blamed by all the 
Bench of Bishops, vexatious to the clergy, and highly 
injurious to the church. We mean no personal disre- 
spect to the bishop ; we are as ignorant of him as of 
his victims, We should have been heartily glad if the 
debate in Parliament had put an end to these blamea- 
ble excesses; and our only object, in meddling with 
the question, is to restrain the arm of power within 
the limits of moderation and justice; one of the great 
objects which first led to the establishment of this 
Journal, and Avhich, we hope, will always continue to 
characterize its efforts. 



BOTANY BAY. (Edinburgh Review, 1823.) 

1. Letter to Earl Bathurst, by the Hon. H. Grey Bennet, M.P 

2. Report of the Commissioner of Inquiry into the State of the 
Colony of New South Wales. Ordered by the House of Com- 
mons to be printed, ldth June, 1822. 

Mr. Bigge's Report is somewhat long, and a little 
clumsy ; but it is altogether the production of an hon- 
est, sensible, and respectable man, who has done his 
duty to the public, and justified the expense of his 
mission to the fifth or pickpocket quarter of the globe. 

What manner of man is Governor Macquarrie ? — is 
all that Mr. Bennet says of him in the House of Com- 
mons true ? These are the questions which Lord Ba- 
thurst sent Mr". Bigge, and very properly sent him, 
28,000 miles to answer. The answer is, that Governor 
Macquarrie is not a dishonest man, nor a jobber ; but 
arbitrary, in many things scandalously negligent, very 
often wrong-headed, and, upon the whole, very defi- 
cient in that good sense, and vigorous understanding, 
which his new and arduous situation so manifestly re- 
quires. 

Ornamental architecture in Botany Bay ! How it 
could enter into the head of any human being to adorn 
public buildings at the Bay, or to aim at any other ar- 
chitectural purpose but the exclusion of wind and rain, 
we are utterly at a loss to conceive. Such an expense 
is not only lamentable for the waste of property it 
makes in the particular instance, but because it de- 
stroys that guarantee of sound sense which the go- 
vernment at home must require in those who preside 
over distant colonies. A man who thinks of pillars 



BOTANY BAY. 



123 



and pilasters, when half the colony are wet through 
for want of any covering at all, cannot be a wise or 
prudent person He seems to be ignorant, that the 
prevention of rheumatism in all young colonies is a 
much more important object than the gratification of 
taste, or the display of skill. 

'I suggested to Governor Macquarrie the expediency of 
stopping all work then in progress that was merely of an orna- 
mental nature, and of postponing its execution till other more 
important buildings were finished. With this view it was that 
I recommended to the governor to stop the progress of a large 
church, the foundation of which had been laid previous to my 
arrival, and which, by the estimate of Mr. Greenway, the 
architect) would have required six years to complete. By a 
change that I recommended, and which the governor adopted, 
in the destination of the new court-house at Sydney, the ac- 
commodation of a new church is probably by this time secured. 
A.s 1 conceived that considerable advantage had been gained by 
inducing Governor Macquarrie to suspend the progress of the 
larger church, I did not deem it necessary to make any pointed 
objection to the addition of these ornamental parts of the 
smaller one 5 though I regretted to observe in this instance, as 
woll as in those of the new stables at Sydney, the turnpike- 
g&ts-heuse, and the new fountain there, as well as in the re- 
pairs of an old church at Paramatta, how much more the em- 
bellishment of these places had been considered by the governor 
than the real and pressing wants of the colony. The build- 
ings that I had recommended to his early attention in Sydney, 
were, a new gaol, a school-house, and a market-house. The 
defect:! of the first of these buildings will be more particularly 
pointed out when I come to describe the buildings that have 
bemi erected in New South Wales. It is sufficient for me now 
u> observe that they were striking, and of a nature not to be 
remedied by additions or repairs. The other two were in a 
state of absolute ruin; they were also of undeniable import- 
ance and necessity. Having left Sydney in the month of No- 
vember, 1820, with these impressions, and with a belief that the 
suggestions I had made to Governor Macquarrie respecting 
them had been partly acted upon, and would continue to be so 
r mug my absence in Van Dieraen's Land, it was not without 
much suftrise and regret that I learnt, during my residence in 
l i.tt settlement, the resumption of the work at the large 
chmc 1 in Sydney, and the steady continuation of the others 
t'sat I had objected to, especially the governor's stables at 
Sydney. I felt the greater surprise in receiving the informa- 
tion respecting this last-named structure, during my absence 
in Van Dieinen's Land, as the governor himself had, upon many 
occasions; expressed to me his own regret at having ever sanc- 
tioned it, and his consciousness of its extravagant dimensions 
aii, I ostentatious character.' — Report, pp. 51,52. 

One of the great difficulties of Botany Bay is to find 
proper employment for the great mass of convicts who 
ore sent out. Governor Macquarrie selects all the 
best artisans, of every description, for the use of go- 
•. ijrnment ; and puts the poets, attorneys, and politici- 
ans, up to auction. The evil consequences of this are 
manifold! In the first place, from possessing so many 
of the best artificers, the governor is necessarily turn- 
ed into a builder; and immense drafts are drawn upon 
the treasury at home, for buildings better adapted for 
Regent street than the Bay. In the next place, the 
poor settler, finding that the convict attorney is very 
awkward at cutting timber, or catching kangaroos, 
won returns him upon the hands of government, in a 
much worse plight than that in which he was received. 
Not only are governors thus debauched into useless 
and expensive builders, but the colonists, who are 
: (.homing and planning with all the activity of new 
settlers, cannot find workmen to execute their de- 
signs. 

What two ideas are more inseparable than beer and 
Britannia? — what event more awfully important to an 
English colony, than the erection of its first brew- 
Louse ? — and yet it required, in Van Dieman's Land, 
the greatest solicitation to the government, and all 
the influence of Mr. Bigge, to get it effected. The go- 
vernment, having obtained possession of the best 
workmen, keep them; their manumission is much 
more infrequent than that of the useless and unprofita- 
ble convicts ; in other words, one man is punished for 
his skill, and another rewarded for his inutility. Guil- 
ty of being a locksmith — guilty of stone-masonry, or 
brick-making ; — these are the second verdicts brought 
in, in New South Wales ; and upon them the duration 
or mitigation of punishment awarded in the mother- 
country. At the very period when the governor as- 
sured Lord Bathurst, in his despatches, that he kept 
I 



and employed so numerous a gang of workmen, only 
because the inhabitants could not employ them, Mr. 
Bigge informs us, that their services would have been 
most acceptable to the colonists. Most of the set- 
tlers, at the time of Mr. Bigge's arrival, from repeated 
refusals and disappointments, had been so convinced 
of the impossibility of obtaining workmen, that they 
had ceased to make application to the governor. Is 
it to be believed, that a governor, placed over a land 
of convicts, and capable of guarding his limbs from 
any sudden collision with odometrous stones, or verti- 
cal posts of direction, should make no distinction be- 
tween the simple convict and the double and treble 
convict — the man of three juries, who has three times 
appeared at the Bailey, trilarcenous — three times dri- 
ven over the seas ? 

'I think it necessary to notice the want of attention that has 
prevailed, until a very late period, at Sydney, to the circum- 
stances of those convicts who have been transported a second 
and a third time. Although the knowledge of these facts is 
transmitted in the hulk lists, or acquired without difficulty 
during the passage, it never has occurred to Governor Mac- 
quarrie or to the superintendents of convicts, to make any 
difference in the condition of these men, not even to disappoint 
the views that they may be supposed to have indulged by the 
success of a criminal enterprise in England, and by transfer- 
ring the fruits of it to New South Wales. 

' To accomplish this very simple but important object, no- 
thing more was necessary than to consign these men to any 
situation rather than that which their friends had selected for 
them, and distinctly to declare in the presence of their com- 
rades at the first muster on tin ir arrival, that no consideration 
or favour would be shown to those who had violated the law a 
second time, and that the mitigation of their sentences must be 
indefinitely postponed.' — Report, p. 19. 

We were not a little amused at Governor Macquar- 
rie's laureate — a regular Mr. Southey — who, upon the 
king's birth day, sings the praises of Governor Mac- 
quarrie.* The case of this votary of Apollo and 
Mercury was a case for life ; the offence a menacing 
epistle, or, as low people call it, a threatening letter. 
He has been pardoned, however — bursting his shack- 
les, like Orpheus of old, with song and metre, and is 
well spoken of by Mr. Bigge, but no specimen of his 
poetry given. One of the best and most enlightened 
men in the settlement appears to be Mr. Marsden, a 
clergyman at Paramatta . Mr. Bennet represents him 
as a gentleman of great feeling, whose life is embit- 
tered by the scenes of horror and vice it is his lot to 
witness at Paramatta. Indeed, he says of himself, 
that, in consequence of these things, c he does not en- 
joy one happy moment from the beginning to the end 
of the week V This letter, at the time, produced a 
very considerable sensation in this country. The idea 
of a man of refinement and feeling wearing away his 
life in the midst of scenes of crime and debauchery to 
which he can apply no corrective is certainly a very 
melancholy and affecting picture ; but there is no story, 
however elegant and eloquent, which does not require, 
for the purposes of justice, to be turned to the other 
side, and viewed in reverse. The Rev. Mr. Marsden 
(says Mr. Bigge), being himself accustomed to traffic 
in spirits, must necessarily feel displeased at having 
so many public houses licensed in the neighbourhood, 
-(p. 14.) 

'As to Mr. Marsden's troubles of mind,' (says the governor,) 
' and pathetic display of sensibility and humanity, they must 
be so deeply seated, and so far removed from the surface, as 
to escape all possible observation. His habits are those of a 
man for ever engaged in some active, animated pursuit. No 
man travels more from town to town, or from house to house. 
His deportment is at all times that of a person the most gay 
and happy. When I was honoured with his society, he was 
by far the most cheerful person I met in the colony. Where 
his hours of sorrow were spent, it is hard to divine ; for the 
variety of his pursuits, both in his own concerns and those of 
others, is so extensive, in farming, grazing, manufactories, 
transactions, that, with his clerical duties, he seems, to use a 
common phrase, to have his hands full of work. And the par 
ticular subject to which he imputes this extreme depression of 
mind, is, besides, one for which few people here will give him 
much credit.' — Macquarrie's Letter to Lord Sidmouth, p. 18. 

There is certainly a wide difference between a man 
of so much feeling, that he has not a moment's happi- 

* Vide Report, p. 146. 



124 



WORKS OF THE REV. SIDNEY SMITH. 



ness from the beginning to the end of the week, and a 
little merry bustling clergyman, largely concerned in 
the sale of rum, and brisk at a bargain for barley. Mr. 
Bigge's evidence, however, is very much in favour of 
Mr. Marsden. He seems to think him a man of highly 
respectable character and superior understanding, and 
that he has been dismissed from the magistracy by 
Governor Macquarrie, in a very rash, unjustifiable, 
and even tyrannical manner ; and in these opinions, 
we must say, the facts seem to bear out the report of 
the commissioner. 

Colonel Macquarrie not only dismisses honest and 
irreproachable men in a country where their existence 
is scarce, and their services inestimable, but he ad- 
vances convicts to the situation and dignity of magis- 
trates. Mr. Bennet lays great stress upon this, and 
makes it one of his strongest charges against the go- 
vernor ; and the commissioner also takes part against 
it. But we confess we have great doubts on the sub- 
ject ; and are by no means satisfied, that the system 
of the governor was not, upon the whole, the wisest 
and best adapted to the situation of the colony. Men 
are governed by words; and by the infamous term 
convict, are comprehended crimes of the most differ- 
ent degrees and species of guilt. One man is trans- 
ported for stealing three hams and a pot of sausages ; 
and in the next berth to him on board the transport is 
a young surgeon, who has been engaged in the mutiny 
at the Nore ; the third man is for extorting money ; 
the fourth was in a respectable situation of life at the 
time of the Irish rebellion, and was so ill read in 
history, as to imagine that Ireland had been ill treated 
by England, and so bad a reasoner as to suppose, that 
nine Catholics ought not to pay tithes to one Protes- 
tant. Then comes a man who set his house on fire, 
to cheat the Phoenix office; and lastly, that most 
glaring of all human villains, a poacher, driven from 
Europe, wife and child, by thirty lords of manors, at 
the Quarter Sessions, for killing a partridge. Now, 
all these are crimes no doubt — particularly the last ; 
but they are surely crimes of very different degrees of 
intensity, to which different degrees of contempt and 
horror are attached — and from which those who have 
committed them may, by subsequent morality, emanci- 
pate themselves, with different degrees of difficulty, 
and with more or less of success. A warrant granted 
by a reformed bacon stealer would be absurd; but 
there is hardly any reason why a foolish hot-brained 
young blockhead, who chose to favour the mutineers 
at the Nore, when he was sixteen years of age, may 
not make a very loyal subject, and a very respectable 
and respected magistrate when he is forty years of 
age, and has cast his Jacobine teeth, and fallen into 
the practical jobbing and loyal baseness which so 
commonly developes itself about that period of life. 
Therefore, to say that a man must be placed in no 
situation of trust or elevation, as a magistrate, merely 
because he is a convict, is to govern mankind with a 
dictionary, and to surrender sense and usefulness to 
sound. Take the following case, for instance, from 
Mr. Bigge : — 

• The next person from the same class, that was so distin- 
guished by Gov. Macquarrie, was the Rev. Mr. Fulton. He 
was transported by the sentence of a court martial in Ireland, 
during the Rebellion ; and on his arrival in New South Wales 
in the year 1800, was sent to Norfolk Island to officiate as 
chaplain. He returned to New South Wales in the year 1804, 
and performed the duties of chaplain at Sydney and Para- 
matta. 

• In the divisions that prevailed in the colony previous to the 
arrest of Governor Bligh, Mr. Fulton took no part ; but hap- 
pening to form one of his family when the person of the 
governor was menaced with violence, he courageously opposed 
himself to the military party that entered the house, and gave 
an example of courage and devotion to Governor Bligh, which, 
if partaken either by the officer or his few adherents, would 
have spared him the humiliation of a personal arrest, and 
rescued his authority from open and violent suspension.' — 
Report,??. 83, 84. 

The particular nature of the place too must be re- 
membered. It is seldom, we suspect, that absolute 
dunces go to the Bay, but commonly men of active 
minds, and considerable talents in their various lines 
—who have not learnt, indeed, the art of self-discip- 



line and control, but who are sent to learn it in the 
bitter school of adversity. And when this medicine 
produces its proper effect — when sufficient time has 
been given to show a thorough change in character and 
disposition — a young colony really cannot afford to 
dispense with the services of any person of superior 
talents. Activity, resolution, and acuteness, are of 
such immense importance in the hard circumstances 
of a new state, that they must be eagerly caught at, 
and employed as soon as they are discovered. Though 
all may not be quite so unobjectionable as could be 
wished — 

\ Res dura, et regni novitas me talia cogunt 
Moliri' — 

as Colonel Macquarrie probably quoted to Mr. Com- 
missioner Bigge. As for the conduct of those extra- 
moralists, who come to settle in a land of crime, and 
refuse to associate with a convict legally pardoned, 
however light his original offence, however perfect 
his subsequent conduct — we have no toleration for 
such folly and foppery. To sit down to dinner with 
men who have not been tried for their fives is a luxury 
which cannot be enjoyed in such a countrj r . It is en- 
tirely out of the question ; and persons so dainty, and 
so truly admirable, had better settle at Clapham Com- 
mon than at Botany Bay. Our trade hi Australasia is 
to turn scoundrels into honest men. If you come 
among us, and bring with you a good character, and 
will lend us your society, as a stimulus and reward to 
men recovering from degradation, you will confer the 
greatest possible benefit upon the colony ; but if you 
turn up your nose at repentance, insult those unhappy 
people with your character, and fiercely stand up as a 
moral bully, and a virtuous braggadocio, it would have 
been far better for us if Providence had directed you 
to any other part of the globe than to Botany Bay — 
which was colonized, not to gratify the insolence ol 
Pharisees, but to heal the contrite spirit of repentant 
sinners. Mr. Marsden, who has no happiness from 
six o'clock Monday morning, till the same hour the 
week following, will not meet pardoned convicts in 
society. We have no doubt Mr. Marsden is a very 
respectable clergyman ; but is there not something 
very different from this in the Gospel ? The .most re- 
solute and inflexible persons in the rejection of pardon- 
ed convicts were some of the marching regiments 
stationed at Botany Bay — men, of course, Avho had 
uniformly shunned, in the Old World, the society of 
gamesters, prostitutes, drunkards, and blasphemers — 
who had ruined no tailors, corrupted no wives, and 
had entitled themselves, by a long course of solemni- 
ty and decorum, to indulge in all the insolence of 
purity and virtue. 

In this point, then, of restoring convicts to society, 
we side, as far'as the principle goes, with the gover- 
nor ; but we are far from undertaking to say that his 
application of the principle has been on all occasions 
prudent and judicious. Upon the absurdity of his con- 
duct in attempting to force the society of the pardon- 
ed convicts upon the undetected part of the colony, 
there can be no doubt. These are points upon which 
every body must be allowed to judge for themselves. 
The greatest monarchs in Europe cannot control opi- 
nion upon those points — sovereigns far exceeding Co- 
lonel Lachlan Macquarrie, in the antiquity of their 
dynasty, and the extent, wealth, and importance ot 
their empire. 

' It was in vain to assemble them' (the pardoned convicts) 
' even on public occasions, at Government House, and to point 
them out to the especial notice and favour of strangers, or to 
favour them with particular marks of his own attention upon 
these occasions, if they still continued to be shunned, or disre- 
garded by the rest of the company. 

' With the exception of the Rev. Mr. Fulton, and, on some 
occasions, of Mr. Redfern, I never observed that the other 
persons of this class participated in the general attentions ol 
the company ; and the evidence of Mr. Judge Advocate Wylde 
and Major Bell both prove the embarrassment in which they 
were left on occasions that came within their notice. 

1 Nor has the distinction that has been conferred upon them 
by Governor Macquarrie produced any effect in subduing the 
prejudices or objections of the class of free inhabitants to asso- 
ciate with them. One instance only has occurred, in which the 
wife of a respectable individual, and a magistrate, has been 



BOTANY BAY. 



125 



visited by the wives of the officers of the garrison, and by a 
few of the married ladies of the colony. It is an instance that 
reflects equal credit upon the individual herself, as upon the 
feelings and motives' of those by whom she has been noticed ; 
but the circumstances of her case were very peculiar, and those 
that led to her introduction to society were very much of a 
personal kind. It has generally been thought that such in- 
stances would have been more numerous if Governor Mac- 
quarrie had allowed every person to follow the dictates of their 
own judgment upon a subject, which, of all others, men are 
least disposed to be dictated to, and most disposed to judge for 
themselves.' 

'Although the emancipated convicts, whom he has selected 
from their class, are persons who generally bear a good cha- 
racter in New South Wales, yet that opinion of them is by no 
means universal. Those, however, who entertained a good 
opinion of them would have proved it by their notice, as Mr. 
M'Arthur has been in the habit of doing, by the kind and 
marked notice that he took of Mr. Fitzgerald; and those who 
entertained a different opinion, would not have contracted an 
aversion to the principle of their introduction, from being 
obliged to witness what they considered to be an indiscreet 
and erroneous application of it.' — Report, p. 150. 

We do not think Mr. Bigge exactly seizes the sense 
of Colonel Macquarrie's phrase, when the colonel 
speaks of restoring men to the rank of society they 
have lost. Men may either be classed by wealth and 
education, or by character. All honest men, whether 
counts or cobblers, are of the same rank, if classed 
by moral distinctions. It is a common phrase to say 
that such a man can no longer be ranked among 
honest men ; that he has been degraded from the class 
of respectable persons ; and, therefore, by restoring 
a convict to the rank he has lost, the governor may 
very fairly be supposed to mean the moral rank. In 
discussing the question of granting offices of trust to 
convicts, the importance of the Sclerati must not be 
overlooked. Their numbers are very considerable. 
They have one-eigthth of all the granted land in the 
colony ; and there are among them individuals of very 
large fortune. Mr. Redfern has 2600 acres, Mr. Lord 
4365 acres, and Mr. Samuel Terry 19,000 acres. As 
this man's history is a specimen of the mud and dirt 
out of which great families often arise, let the Terry 
Filii the future warriors, legislators, and nobility of 
the Bay, learn from what, and whom, they sprang. 

Tl e first of these individuals, Samuel Terry, was trans- 
ported to the colony when young. He was placed in a gang 
of stone masons at Paramatta, and assisted the building of the 
gaol. Mr. Marsden states, that during this period he was 
brought before him for neglect of duty, and punished ; but by 
his industry in other ways, he was enabled to set up a small 
retail shop, in which he continued till the expiration of his 
term of service. He then repaired to Sydney, where he ex- 
tended his business, and, by marriage, increased his capital. 
He for many years kept a public house and retail shop, to 
which the smaller settlers resorted from the country, and 
where, after intoxicating themselves with spirits, they signed 
obligations and powers of attorney to confess judgment, which 
were always kept ready for execution. By these means, and 
by an active use of the common arts of overreaching ignorant 
men, Samuel Terry has been able to accumulate a considerable 
capital, and a quantity of land in New South Wales, inferior 
only to that which is held by Mr. D'Arcy Wentworth. He 
ceased, at the late regulations introduced by the, magistrates 
at Sydney, in February, 1820, to sell spirituous liquors, and he 
is now become one of the principal speculators in the purchase 
of investments at Sydney, and lately established a water-mill 
in the swampy plains between that town and Botany Bay, 
which did not succeed. Out of the 19,000 acres of land held by 
Samuel Terry, 140 only are stated to be cleared ; but he pos- 
sesses 1450 head of horned cattle, and 3800 sheep.'— Report, 
p. 141. 

Upon the subject of the New South Wales Bank, — 
Mr. Bigge observes,— 

'Upon the first of these occasions, it became an object both 
with Governor Macquarrie and Mr. Judge-Advocate Wyld, 
who took an active part in the establishment of the bank, to 
unite in its favour the support and contributions of the indi- 
viduals of all classes of the colony. Governor Macquarrie felt 
assured that, without such co-operation, the bank could not be 
established ; for he was convinced that the emancipated con- 
victs were the most opulent members of the community. A 
committee was formed for the purpose of drawing up the 
rules and regulations of the establishment, in which are to be 
found the names of George Howe, the printer of the Sydney 
Gazette, who was also a retail dealer ; Mr. Simon Lord, and 
Mr. Edward Eager, all emancipated convicts, and the last only 
conditionally. 



'Governor Macquarrie had always understood, and strongly 
wished, that in asking for the co-operation of all classes of the 
community in the formation of the bank, a sh re in its direc- 
tion and management should also be communicated to them.' 
I —Report, p. 150. 

In the discussion of this question, we became ac- 
quainted with a piece of military etiquette, of which 
we were previously ignorant. An officer, invited to 
dinner by the governor, cannot refuse, unless in case 
of sickness. This is the most complete tyranny we 
ever heard of. If the officer comes out to his duty at 
the proper minute, with his proper number of buttons 
and epaulettes, what matters it to the governor or any 
body else, where he dines ? He may as well be or- 
dered what to eat, as where to dine — be confined to 
the upper or under side of the meat — be denied gravy, 
or refused melted butter. But there is no end to the 
small tyranny, and puerile vexations of a military 
life. 

The mode of employing convicts upon their arrival 
appears to us very objectionable. If a man is skilful 
as a mechanic, he is added to the government gangs ; 
and in proportion to his skill and diligence, his chance 
of manumission, or of remission of labour, is lessened. 
If he is not skilful, or not skilful in any trade wanted 
by government, he is applied for by some settler, — to 
whom he pays from 5s. to 10s. a-week; and is then 
left at liberty to go where, and work for whomsoever, 
be pleases. In the same manner, a convict who is 
rich is applied for, and obtains his weekly liberty and 
idleness by the purchased permission of the person to 
whom he is consigned. 

The greatest possible inattention or ignorance ap- 
pears to have prevailed in manumitting convicts for 
labour — and for such labour ! not for cleansing Augean 
stables, or draining Pontine marshes, or damming out 
a vast length of the Adriatic, but for working five 
weeks with a single horse and cart in making the road 
to Bathurst Plains. Was such labour worth five 
pounds ? And is it to be understood, that liberty is 
to be restored to any man who will do five pounds' 
worth of work in Australasia ? Is this comment upon 
transportation to be circulated in the cells of New- 
gate, or in the haunts of those persons who are doomed 
to inhabit them ? 

' Another principle by which Governor Macquarrie has been 
guided in bestowing pardons and indulgences, is that of con- 
sidering them as rewards for any particular labour or enter- 
prise. It was upon this principle, that the men who were em- 
ployed in working upon the Bathurst road, in the year 1815, 
and those who contributed to that operation by the loan of 
their own carts and horses, or of those that they procured, ob- 
tained pardons, emancipations, and tickets of leave. To 39 
men who were employed as labourers in this work, three free 
pardons were given, one ticket of leave, and 35 emancipa- 
tions ; and two of them only had held tickets of leave before 
they commenced their labour. Seven convicts received eman- 
cipations for supplying horses and carts for the carriage of 
provisions and stores as the party was proceedimg ; six out of 
this number having previously held tickets of leave. 

' Eight other convicts (four of whom held tickets of leave) 
received emancipations for assisting with carts, and one horse 
to each, in the transport of provisions and baggage for the use 
of Governor Macquarrie and his suite, on their journey from 
the river Nepean to Bathurst, in the year 1816 ; a service that 
did not extend beyond the period of five weeks, and was at- 
tended with no risk, and very little exertion. 

' Between the months of January, 1816, and June, 1818, nine 
convicts, of whom six held tickets of leave, obtained emancipa- 
tions for sending carts and horses to convey provisions and 
baggage from Paramatta to Bathurst, for the use of Mr. Oxley, 
the surveyor-general, in his two expeditions into the interior 
of the country. And in the same period, 23 convict labourers 
and mechanics obtained emancipations for labour and service 
performed at Bathurst. 

' The nature of the services performed by these convicts, 
and the manner in which some of them were recommended, 
excited much surprise in the colony, as well as great suspicion 
of the purity of the channels through which the recommenda- 
tions passed.' — Report, pp. 122, 123. 

If we are to judge from the number of jobs detected 
by Mr. Bigge, Botany Bay seems very likely to do 
justice to the mother-country from whence it sprang 
Mr. Redfern, surgeon, seems to use the public rhubarb 
for bis private practice. Mr. Hutchinson, superinten- 
dent, makes a very comfortable thing of the assign- 
ment of convicts. Major Druit was found selling theix 



126 



WORKS OF THE REV. SIDNEY SMITH. 



own cabbages to government in a very profitable man- 
ner; and many comfortable little practices of this 
nature are noticed by Mr. Bigge. 

Among other sources of profit, the superintendent 
of the convicts was the banker ; two occupations 
which seem to be eminently compatible with each 
other, inasmuch as they afford to the superintendent 
the opportunity of evincing his impartiality and load- 
ing with equal labour every convict, without reference 
to their banking account , to the profit they afford, 
or the trouble they create. It appears, however (very 
strangely ), from the report, that the money of con- 
victs was not always recovered with the same readi- 
ness it was received. 

Mr. Richard Fitzgerald, in September, 1819, was 
comptroller of Provisions in Emu Plains, storekeeper 
at Windsor, and superintendent of government works 
at the same place. He was also a proprietor of land 
and stock in the neighbourhood, and kept a public 
house in Windsor, of which an emancipated Jew was 
the ostensible manager, upon whom Fitzgerald gave 
orders for goods and spirits in payment for labour on 
the public works. These two places are fifteen miles 
distant from each other, and convicts are to be watch- 
ed and managed at both. It cannot be imagined that 
the convicts are slow in observing or following these 
laudable examples; and their conduct will add an- 
other instance of the vigilance of Macquarrie's govern- 
ment. 

'The stores and materials used in the different buildings at 
Sydney are kept in a magazine in the lumber yard, and are 
distributed according to the written requisitions of the differ- 
ent overseers that are made during the day, and that are ad- 
dressed to the storekeeper in the lumber yard. They are con- 
veyed from thence to the buildings by the convict mechanics; 
and no account of the expenditure or employment of the stores 
is kept by the overseers, or rendered to the store-keeper. It 
was only in the early part of the year 1820 that an account 
was opened by him of the different materials used in each 
work or building ; and in February, 1821, this account was 
considerably in arrear. The temptation, therefore, that is 
afforded to the convict mechanics who work in the lumber- 
yard, in secreting tools, stores, and implements, and to those 
who work at the different buildings, is very great, and the loss 
to government is considerable. The tools, moreover, have not 
latterly been mustered as they used to be once a month, ex- 
cept where one of the convicts is removed from Sydney to an- 
other station.' — Report, pp. 36, 37. 

If it was right to build fine houses in a new colony, 
common sense seems to point out a control upon the 
expenditure, with such a description of workmen. 
What must become of that country where the build- 
ings are useless, the governor not wise, the public the 
paymaster, the accounts not in existence, and all the 
artisans thieves ? 

An horrid practice prevailed, of the convicts accept- 
ing a sum of money from the captain, in their voyage 
out, in lieu of their regular ration of provisions. This 
ought to be restrained by the severest penalties. 

What is it that can be urged for Governor Macquar- 
rie, after the following picture of the hospital at Para- 
matta ? It not only justifies his recall, but seems to 
require (if there are means of reaching such neglect) 
his severe punishment. 

1 The women, who had become most profligate and hardened 
by habit, were associated in their daily tasks with those who 
had very lately arrived, to whom the customs and practices of 
the colony were yet unknown, and who might have escaped 
the consequences of such pernicious lessons, if a little care, 
and a small portion of expense, had been spared in providing 
them with a separate apartment during the hours of labour. 
As a place of employment, the factory at Paramatta was not 
only very defective, but very prejudicial. The insufficient ac- 
commodation that it afforded to those females who might be 
well disposed, presented an early incitement, if not an excuse, 
for their resorting to indiscriminate prostitution ; and on the 
evening of their arrival at Paramatta, those who were not de- 
ploring their state of abandonment and distress, were travers- 
ing the streets in search of the guilty means of future support. 
The state in which the place itself was kept, and the state of 
disgusting filth in which I found it, both on an early visit after 
my arrival, and on one preceding my departure ; the disorder- 
ed, unruly, and licentious appearance of the women, manifest- 
ed the little degree of control in which the female convicts 
were kept, and the litttle attention that was paid to any thing 
beyond the mere performance of a certain portion of labour.' 
— Report, p. 70. 



It might naturally be supposed, that any man sent 
across the globe with a good salary, for the express 
purpose of governing, and, if possible, of reforming 
convicts, would have preferred the morals of his con- 
victs to the accommodation of his horses. Let Mr. 
Bigge, a very discreet and moderate man, be heard 
upon these points. 

'Having observed, in Governor Macquarrie's answer to 
Mr. Marsden, that he justified the delay that occurred, and 
was still to take place, in the construction of a proper place 
of reception for the female convicts, by the want of any 
specific instructions from your lordship to undertake such a 
building, and which he states that he solicited at an early 
period of his government, and considered indispensable, I 
felt it to be my duty to call to the recollection of Governor 
Macquarrie, that he had undertaken several buildings of 
much less urgent necessity than the factory at Paramatta, 
without waiting for any such indispensable authority : and 
I now find that the construction of it was announced by 
him to your lordship in the year 1817, as then in his contem- 
plation, without making any specific allusion to the evils 
which the want of it had so long occasioned : that the con- 
tract for building it was announced to the public on the 21st 
May, 1813, and that your lordship's approval of it was not 
signified until the 24th August, 1818, and could not have 
reached Governor Macquarrie's hands until nearly a year 
after thework had been undertaken. It appears, therefore, 
that if want of authority had been the sole cause of delay in 
budding the factory at Paramatta, that cause would not only 
have operated in the month of March, 1818, but it would 
have continued to operate until the want of authority had 
been formerly supplied. Governor Macquarri, however, 
must be conscious, that after he had stated to Mr. Marsden 
in the year 1815, and with an appearance of regret, that the 
want of authority prevented him from undertaking the con 
struction of a building of such undeniable necessity and ixn 
portance as the factory at Paramatta, he had undertaken 
several buildings, which, though useful in themselves, were 
of less comparative importance ; and had commenced, in the 
month of August, 1817, the laborious and expensive construc- 
tion of his own stables at Sydney, to which I have already allud- 
ed, without any previous communication to your lordship, 
and in direct opposition to an instruction that must have 
then reached him, and that forcibly warned him of the con- 
sequences.' — Report, p. 71. 

It is the fashion very much among the tories of the 
House of Commons, and all those who love the effects 
of public liberty, without knowing or caring how it is 
preserved, to attack every person who complains of 
abuses, and to accuse him of gross exaggeration. No 
sooner is the name of any public thief, or of any tor- 
mentor, or oppressor, mentioned in that honourable 
house, than out bursts the spirit of jobbing eulogium, 
and there is not a virtue under heaven which is not as- 
cribed to the delinquent in question, and vouched for 
by the most irrefragable testimony. If Mr. Bennet or 
Sir Francis Burdett had attacked them, and they had 
now been living, how many honourable members would 
have vouched for the honesty of Dudley and Empson, 
the gentleness of Jeffries, or the genius of Blackmore ? 
What human virtue did not Aris and the governor of II- 
chester gaol possess ? Who was not ready to come 
forward to vouch for the attentive humanity of Gover- 
nor Macquarrie ? What scorn and wit would it have 
produced from the treasury bench, if Mr. Bennet had 
stated the superior advantages of the horses over the 
convicts ? — and all the horrors and immoralities, the 
filth and wretchedness, of the female prison of Para- 
matta? Such a case, proved, as this now is beyond 
the power of contradiction, ought to convince the 
most hardy and profligate scoffers, that there is really 
a great deal of occasional neglect, and oppression in 
the conduct of public servants ; and that in spite of all 
the official praise, which is ever ready for the perpe- 
trators of crime, there is a great deal of real malver- 
sation which should be dragged to the light of day, 
by the exertions of bold and virtuous men. If we had 
found, from the report of Mr. Bigge, that the charges 
of Mr. Bennet were without any, or without adequate 
foundation, it would have given us great pleasure to 
have vindicated the governor ; but Mr. Bennet has 
proved his indictment. It is impossible to read the 
foregoing quotation, and not to perceive, that the con- 
duct and proceedings of Governor Macquarrie imperi- 
ously required the exposure they have received ; and 
that it would have been much to the credit of govern- 



BOTANY BAY. 



127 



ment if he had been removed long ago from a situation 
which, but for the exertions of Mr. Bennet, we believe, 
he would have held to this day. 

The sick, from Mr. Bigge's report, appear to have 
fared as badly as the sinful. Good water was scarce, 
proper persons to wait upon the patients could not be 
obtained ; and so numerous were the complaints from 
this quarter, that the governor makes an order for the 
exclusion of all hospital grievances and complaints, 
except on one day in the month — dropsy swelling, how- 
ever, fever burning, and ague shaking, in the mean 
time, without waiting for the arrangements of Gover- 
nor Macquarrie, or consulting the Mollia tempora 
fandi. 

In permittiug individuals to distil their own grain, 
the government of Botany Bay appears to us to be 
quite right. It is impossible, in such a colony, to 
prevent unlawful distillation to a considerable extent ; 
and it is as well to raise upon spirits (as something 
must be taxed) that slight duty which renders the con- 
traband trade not worth following. Distillation, too, 
always insures a magazine against famine, by which 
New South Wales has more than once been severely 
visited. It opens a market for grain where markets 
are very distant, and where redundance and famine 
seem very often to succeed each other. The cheap- 
ness of spirits, to such working people as know how 
to use them with moderation, is a great blessing ; and 
we doubt whether that moderation, after the first burst 
of ebriety, is not just as likely to be learnt in plenty, 
as in scarcity. 

We were a little surprised at the scanty limits al- 
lowed to convicts for sleeping on board the transports. 
Mr. Bigge, (of whose sense and humanity we really 
have not the slightest doubt) states eighteen inches to 
be quite sufficient — twice the length of a small sheet 
of letter-paper. The printer's devil, who carries our 
works to the press, informs us, that the allowance to 
the demons of the type is double foolscap length, or 
twenty-four inches. The great city upholsterers ge- 
nerally consider six feet as barely sufficient for a per- 
son just rising in business, and assisting occasionally 
at official banquets. 

Mrs. Fry's* system is well spoken of by Mr. Bigge ; 
and its useful effect in promoting order and decency 
among floating convicts fully admitted. 

In a voyage to Botany Bay by Mr. Read, he states 
that, while the convict vessel lay at anchor, about to 
sail, a boat from shore reached the ship, and from it 
stepped a clerk of the Bank of England. The convicts 
felicitated themselves upon the acquisition of so gen- 
tlemanlike a companion ; but it soon turned out that 
the visitant had no intention of making so long a voy- 
age. Finding that they were not to have the pleasure 
of his company, the convicts very naturally thought of 
picking his pockets; the necessity of which profes- 
sional measure was prevented by a speedy distribution 
of their contents. Forth from his bill-case, this votary 
of Plutus drew his nitid Newlands; all the forgers and 
utterers were mustered on deck ; and to each of them 
was well and truly paid into his hand, a five pound 
note ; less acceptable, perhaps, than if privately re- 
moved from the person, but still joyfully received. 
This was well intended on the part of the directors ; 
but the consequences it is scarcely necessary to enu- 
merate ; a large stock of rum was immediately laid 
in from the circumambient slop boats ; and the mate- 



* We are sorry that it should have been imagined, from 
some of our late observations on prison discipline, that we 
meant to disparage the exertions of Mrs. Fry. For prisoners 
before trial, it is perfect ; but where imprisonment is intended 
for punishment, and not for detention, it requires, as we have 
endeavoured to show, a very different system. The Prison 
Society (an excellent, honourable, and most useful institution 
of some of the best men in England,) have certainly, in their 
first numbers, fallen into the common mistake of supposing 
that the reformation of the culprit, and got the prevention of 
the crime, was the main object of imprisonment ; and have, in 
consequence, taken 6ome false views of the method of treating 
prisoners — the exposition of which, after the usual manner of 
flesh and blood, makes them a little angry. But, in objects of 
so high a nature, what matters who is right ?— the only ques- 
tion is, what is right ? 



rials of constant intoxication secured for the rest of 
the voyage. 

The following account of pastoral convicts is strik- 
ing and picturesque-: — 

'I observed that a great many of the convicts in Van Die- 
men's Land wore jackets and trowsers of the kangaroo skin, 
and sometimes caps of the same material, which they obtain 
from the stock -keepers who are employed in the interior of 
the country. The labour of several of them differs, in this 
respect, from the convicts in New South Wales, and is rather 
personal than agricultural. Permission having been given, 
for the last five years, to the settlers to avail themselves of the 
ranges of open plains and valleys that lie on either side of the 
road leading from Austin's Ferry to Launceston, a distance of 
120 miles, their flocks and herds have been committed to the 
care of convict shepherds and stock-keepers, who are sent to 
these cattle-ranges, distant sometimes 30 or 40 miles from their 
masters' estates. 

' The boundaries of these tracts are described in the tickets 
of occupation by which they are held, and which are made 
renewable every year, on payment of a fee to the lieuteuant- 
governor's clerk. One or more convicts are stationed on 
them, to attend to the flocks and cattle, and are supplied with 
wheat, tea, and sugar, at the monthly visits of the owner. 
They are allowed the use of a musket and a few cartridges to 
defend themselves against the natives ; and they have also 
dogs, with which they hunt the kangaroos, whose flesh they 
eat, and dispose of their skins to persons passing from Hob art 
Town to Launceston, in exchange for tea and sugar. Thus 
they obtain a plentiful supply of food and sometimes succeed 
in cultivating a few vegetables. Their habitations are made of 
turf and thatched, as the bark of the dwarf eucalyptus, or 
gum-trees of the plains, and the interior, in Van Diemen's 
Laud, is not of sufficient expanse to form covering or shelter.' 
—Report, pp. 107, 108. 

A London thief, clothed in kangaroo's skins, lodged 
under the bark of the dwarf eucalyptus, and keeping 
sheep, fourteen thousand miles from Piccadilly, with 
a crook bent into the shape of a picklock, is not an 
uninteresting picture ; and an engraving of it might 
have a very salutary effect — provided no engraving 
were made of his convict master, to whom the sheep 
belong. 

The Maroon Indians were hunted by dogs — the fu- 
gitive convicts are recovered by the natives. 

' The native blacks that inhabit the neighbourhood of Port 
Hunter and Port Stephens have become very active in reta- 
king the fugitive convicts. They accompany the soldiers who 
are sent in pursuit, and, by the extraordinary strength ef sight 
they possess, improved by their daily exercise of it in pursuit 
of kangaroos and opossums, they can trace to a great distance, 
with wonderful accuracy, the impressions of the human foot. 
Nor are they afraid of meeting the fugitive convicts in the 
woods, when sent in their pursuit, without the soldiers ; by 
their skill in throwing their long and pointed wooden darts, 
they wound and disable them, strip them of their clothes, and 
bring them back as prisoners, by unknown roads and paths, to 
the Coal river. 

' They are rewarded for these enterprizes by presents of 
maize and blankets ; and, notwithstanding the apprehensions 
of revenge from the convicts whom they bring back, they con- 
tinue to live in Newcastle and its neighbourhood ; but are 
observed to prefer the society of the soldiers to that of the 
convicts.' — Report, p. 117. 

Of the convicts in New South Wales, Mr. Bigge 
found about eight or nine in an hundred to be persons 
of respectable character and conduct, though the evi- 
dence respecting them is not quite satisfactory. But 
the most striking and consolatory passage in the 
whole report is the following : — 

' The marriages of the native-born youths with female con- 
victs are very rare — a circumstance that is attributable to the 
general disinclination to early marriage that is observable 
amongst them, and partly to the abandoned and dissolute 
habits of the female convicts ; but chiefly to a sense of pride in 
the native-born youths, approaching to contempt for the vices 
and depravity of the convicts, even when manifested in the 
persons of thrir own parents.' — Report, p. 105. 

Every thing is to be expected from these feelings. 
They convey to the mother-country the first proof 
that the foundations of a mighty empire are laid. 

We were somewhat surprised to find Governor Mac- 
quarrie contending with Mr. Bigge, that it was no 
part of his, the governor's duty, to select and sepa- 
rate the useless from the useful convicts, or to deter- 
mine, except in particular cases, to whom they are to 



128 



WORKS OF THE REV. SIDNEY SMITH. 



be assigned. In other words, he wishes to effect the 
customary separation of salary and duty— the grand 
principle which appears to pervade all human institu- 
tions, and to be the most invincible of human abuses. 
Not only are church, king, and state, allured by this 
principle of vicarious labour, but the pot-boy has a 
lower pot-boy, who, for a small portion of his princi- 
pal, arranges, with inexhaustible sedulity, the subdi- 
vided portions of drink, and, intensely perspiring, dis- 
perses, in bright pewter, the frothy elements of joy. 

There is a very awkward story of a severe flogging 
inflicted upon three freemen by Governor Macquarrie, 
without complaint to, or intervention of, any magis- 
trate ; a fact not denied by the governor, and for 
which no adequate apology, nor any thing approach- 
ing to an adequate apology, is offered. These Asiatic 
and Satrapical proceedings, however, we have reason 
to think, are exceedingly disrelished by London juries. 
The profits of having been unjustly flogged at Botany 
Bay (Scarlett for the plaintiff) is good property, and 
would fetch a very considerable sum at the auction 
mart. The governor, in many instances, appears to 
have confounded diversity of opinion upon particular 
measures, with systematic opposition to his govern- 
ment, and to have treated as disaffected persons those 
whom, in favourite measures, he could not persuade 
by his arguments, nor influence by his -example, and 
on points where every man has a right to judge for 
himself, and where authority has no legitimate right 
to interfere, much less to dictate. 

To the charges confirmed by the statement of Mr. 
Bigge, Mr. Bennet adds, from the evidence collected 
by the gaol committee, that the fees in the governor's 
court, collected by the authority of the governor, are 
most exorbitant and oppressive ; and that illegal taxes 
are collected under the sole authority of the governor. 
It has loeea made, by colonial regulations, a capital 
offence to steal the wild cattle; and, in 1816, three 
persons were convicted of stealing a wild bull, the 
property of our sovereign lord the king. Now, our sove- 
reign lord the king (whatever be his other merits or 
demerits) is certainly a very good-natured man, and 
would be the first to lament that an unhappy convict 
was sentenced to death for killing one of his wild bulls 
on the other side of the world. The cases of Mr. Moore, 
and of William Stewart, as quoted by Mr. Bennet, are 
very strong. If they are. answerable, they should 
be answered. The concluding letter to Mr. Stewart is, 
to us, the most decisive proof of the unfitness of Colo- 
nel Macquarrie for the situation in which he was 
placed. The ministry at home, after the authenticity 
of the letter was proved, should have seized upon the 
first decent pretext of recalling the governor, of thank- 
ing him, in the name of his sovereign, for his valuable 
services (not omitting his care of the wild bulls,) and 
of dismissing him to half pay — and insignificance. 

As to the trial by jury, we cannot agree with Mr. 
Bennet, that it would be right to introduce it at pre- 
sent, for reasons we have given in a previous article, 
and which we see no reason for altering. The time of 
course will come, when it would be in the highest de- 
gree unjust and absurd to refuse to that settlement 
the benefit of popular institutions. But they are too 
young, too few, and too deficient for such civilized 
machinery at present. ' I cannot come to serve upon 
the jury — the waters of the Hawksbury are out, and I 
have a mile to swim — the kangaroos will break into 
my corn — the convicts have robbed me — my little boy 
has been bitten by an ornithorynchus paradoxus — I 
have sent a man fifty miles with a sack of flour to buy 
d pair of breeches for the assizes, and he has not re- 
turned.' These are the excuses, which, in new colo- 
nies, always prevent trial by jury ; and make it de- 
sirable for the first half century of their existence, 
that they should live under the simplicity and conve- 
nience of such modified despotism (we mean) as a 
British House of Commons, (always containing men 
as bold and honest as the member for Shrewsbury) 
will permit, in the governors of their distant colonies. 

Such are the opinions formed of the conduct of Go- 
vernor Macquarrie by Mr. Bigge. Not the slightest in- 
sinuation is made against the integrity of his charac- 
ter. Though almost every body else has a job, we do 



not perceive that any is imputed to this gentleman ; 
but he is negligent, expensive, arbitrary, ignorant, and 
clearly deficient in abilities for the task committed to 
his charge. It is our decided opinion, therefore, that 
Mr. Bennet has rendered a valuable service to the 
public, in attacking and exposing his conduct. As a 
gentleman and an honest man, there is not the small- 
est charge against the governor ; but a gentleman and 
a very honest man, may very easily ruin a very fine 
colony. The colony itself, disencumbered of Colonel 
Lachlan Macquarrie, will probably become a very fine 
empire ; but we can scarcely believe it is of any pre- 
sent utility as a place of punishment. The history of 
emancipated convicts, who have made a great deal of 
money by their industry and their speculations, neces- 
sarily reaches this country, and prevents men who 
are goaded by want, and hovering between vice and 
virtue, from looking upon it as a place of suffering— 
perhaps leads them to consider it as the land of hope 
and refuge, to them unattainable, except by the com- 
mission of crime. And so they lift up their heads at 
the bar, hoping to be transported — 

« Stabant orantes primi transmittere cursum 
Tendebaritque manus, ripse ulteroris amore.' 

It is not possible, ki the present state of the law, 
that these enticing histories of convict prosperity 
should be prevented, by one uniform system of seven- 
ty exercised in New South Wales, upon all transported 
persons. Such different degrees of guilt are included 
under the term of convict, that it would violate every 
feeling of humanity, and every principle of justice, to 
deal out one measure of punishment to all. We strong- 
ly suspect that this is the root of the evil. We want 
new gradations of guilt to be established by law — new 
names for those gradations — aud a different measure 
of good and evil treatment attached to those denomi- 
nations. In this manner, the mere convict, the rogue 
and convict, and the incorrigible convict, would expect, 
upon their landing, to be treated with very different 
degrees of severity. The first might be merely de- 
tained in New South Wales »without labour or coer- 
cion ; the second compelled, at all events, to work out 
two-thirds of his time, without the possibility of re- 
mission : and the third be destined at once for the 
Coal River.* If these consequences steadily followed 
these gradations of conviction, they would soon he un- 
derstood by the felonious world at home. At present, 
the prosperity of the best convicts is considered to be 
attainable by all ; and transportation to another hemi- 
sphere is looked upon as the renovation of fallen for- 
tunes, and the passport to wealth and power. 

Another circumstance, which destroys all idea of 
punishment in transportation to New South Wales, is 
the enormous expense which that settlement would 
occasion, if it really was made a place of punishment. 
A little wicked tailor arrives, of no use to the archi- 
tectural projects of the governor. He is turned over 
to a settler, who leases this sartorial Borgia his liber, 
ty for five shillings per week, and allows him to steal i 
and snip, what, when, and where he can. The excuse 
for all this mockery of law and justice is, that the ex- 
pense of his maintenance is saved to the government 
at home. But the expense is not saved to the country 
at large. The nefarious needleman writes home that 
he is as comfortable as a finger in a thimble ! that 
though a fraction only of a humanity, he has several 
wives, and is filled every day with rum and kangaroo. 
This, of course, is not lost upon the shop-board; and, 
for the saving of fifteen pence per day, the foundation i 
for many criminal tailors is laid. What is true of tai- • 
lors, is true of tinkers, and all other trades. The 
chances of escape from labour, and of manumission in l 
the Bay, we may depend upon it, are accurately re- 
ported, and perfectly understood in the flash-houses of 
St. Giles : and, while Earl Bathurst is full of jokes and 
joy, public morals are sapped to their foundation. 

* This practice is now resorted to. 



GAME LAWS. 



129 



GAME LAWS. (Edinburgh Review, 1823.) 

A Letter to the Chairman of the Committee of the House of 
Commons, on the Game Laws. By the Hon and Rev. Wil- 
liam Herbert. Ridgway, 1823. 

About the time of the publication of this little 
phamphlet of Mr. Herbert, a committee of the House 
of Commons published a Report on the Game Laws, 
containing a great deal of very curious information 
respecting the sale of game, an epitome of which we 
shall now lay before our readers. The country hig- 
glers who collect poultry, gather up the game from 
the depots of the poachers, and transmit it in the same 
manner as poultry, and in the same packages, to the 
London poulterers, by whom it is distributed to the 
public ; and this traffic is carried on (as far as game 
is concerned) even from the distance of Scotland. — 
The same business is carried on by the porters of 
stage coaches ; and a great deal of game is sold clan- 
destinely by lords of manors, or by gamekeepers, 
without the knowledge of lords of manors ; and prin- 
cipally, as the evidence states, from Norfolk and Suf- 
folk, the great schools of steel traps and spring guns. 
The supply of game, too, is proved to be quite as reg- 
ular as the supply of poultry ; the number of hares 
and partridges supplied rather exceeds that of pheas- 
ants ; but any description of game may be had to any 
amount. Here is part of the evidence. 

'Can you at any time procure any quantity of game ? I 
have no doubt of it.— If you were to receive almost an un- 
-imited order, could you execute it? Yes, I would supply 
the whole city of London, any fixed day once a week, all 
the year through, so that every individual inhabitant should 
have game for his table. — Do you think you could procure 
a thousand pheasants ? Yes; I would be bound to produce 
ten thousand a week. — You would be bound to provide every 
family in London with a dish of game ? Yes ; a partridge, 
or a pheasant, or a hare, or a grouse, or something or other. 
How would you set about doing it ? I should, of course, 
request the persons with whom I am in the habit of dealing, 
to use their influence to bring me what they could by a cer- 
tain day; I should speak to the dealers and the mail-guards, 
and coachmen, to produce a quantity ; and I should send to 
my own connections in one or two manors where I have 
the privilege of selling for those gentlemen ; and should 
send to Scotland to say, that every week the largest quantity 
they could produce was to be sent. Being but a petty sales- 
man, I sell a very small quantity; but I have had about 
4000 head direct from one man. — Can you state the quantity 
of game which has been sent to you during the year ? No ; 
I may say, perhaps, 10,000 head; mine is a limited trade; I 
speak comparatively to that of others ; I only supply pri- 
vate families.'— Report, p. 20. 

Poachers who go out at night eannot, of course, like 
regular tradesmen, proportion the supply to the de- 
mand, but having once made a contract, they kill all 
they can ; and hence it happens that the game market 
is sometimes very much overstocked, and great quan- 
tities of game either thrown away, or disposed of by 
Irish hawkers to the common people at very inferior 
prices. 

'Does it ever happen to you to be obliged to dispose of 
poultry at the same low prices you are obliged to dispose of 
game? It depends upon the weather; often, when there is 
a considerable quantity on hand, and owing to the weather, 
it will not keep till the following day, I am obliged to take 
any price that is offered; but we can always turn either 
poultry or game into some price or other; and if it was not 
for the Irish hawkers, hundreds and hundreds of heads of 
game would be spoiled and thrown away. It is out of the 
power of any person to conceive for one moment the quan- 
tity of game that is hawked in the streets. I have had 
opportunity more than other persons of knowing this ; for 
I have sold, I may say, more game than any other person 
in the city; and we serve hawkers indiscriminately, persons 
who come and purchase probably six fowls or turkeys and 
geese, and they will buy heads of game with them.'— Re- 
port, p. 22. 

Live birds are sent up as well as dead; eggs as 
well as birds. The price of pheasants' eggs last year 
was 8s. per dozen ; of partridges' eggs, 2s. The price 
of hares was from 3s. to 3s. 6d. ; of partridges, from 
Is. 6d. to 2s. 6d. ; of pheasants, from 5s. to 5s. 6d. each, 
and sometimes as low as Is. 6d. 

What have you given for game this year ? It is very low 
Indeed I am sick of it ; I do not think I shall ever deal 



again. We have got game this season as low as yialf-a. 
crown a brace (birds), and pheasant as low as Is. a Drace. 
It is so plentiful, there has been no end to spoiling it this 
season. It is so plentiful, it is of no use. In war time it is 
worth having ; then they fetched 7a. and 8s. a brace.'— Re 
port, p. S3. 

All the poulterers, too, even the most respectable 
state, that it is absolutely necessary they should 
carry on this illegal traffic in the present state of the 
game laws ; because their regular customers for 
poultry would infallibly leave any poulterer's shop 
from whence they could not be supplied with game. 

' I have no doubt that it is the general wish at present of 
the trade not to deal in the article; but they are all, of 
course, compelled from their connections. If they cannot 
get game from one person, they can from another. 

* Do you believe tnat poulterers are not to be found who 
would take out licenses, and would deal with those very 
persons, for the purposes of obtaining a greater profit than 
they would have dealing as you would do ? I think the 
poulterers in general are a respectable set of men, and 
would not countenance such a thing ; they feel now that 
they are driven into a corner ; that there may be men who 
would countenance irregular proceedings, I have no doubt. 
— Would it be their interest to do so, considering the penal- 
ty ? No, I think not. The poulterers are perfectly well 
aware that they are committing a breach of the law at pre- 
sent. — Do you suppose that those persons, respectable as 
they are, who are now committing a breach of the law, 
would not equally commit that breach if the law were al- 
tered ? No, certainly not ; at present it is so connected 
with their business that they cannot help it. — You said just 
now, that they were driven into a corner ; what did you 
mean by that ? We are obliged to aid and abet those men 
who commit those depredations, because of the constant de- 
mand for game, from different customers whom we supply 
with poultry. — Could you carry on your business as a poul- 
terer, if you refused to supply game ? By no means ; be- 
cause some of the first people in the land require it of me.' 
— Report, p. IS. 

When that worthy errorist, Mr. Bankes, brought in 
his bill of additional severities against poachers, 
there was no man of sense and reflection who did not 
anticipate the following consequences of the measure. 

' Do you find that less game has been sold in consequence 
of the bill rendering it penal to sell game ? Upon my word, 
it did not make the slightest difference in the world.— Not 
immediately after it was made? No; I do not think it 
made the slightest difference. — It did not make the slightest 
sensation ? No, I never sold a bird less. — Was not there a 
resolution of the poulterers not to sell game ? I was secre- 
tary to that committee. — What was the consequence of that 
resolution ? A great deal of ill blood in the trade. One 
gentleman who just left the room did not come into my 
ideas. I never had a head of game in my house ; all my 
neighbours sold it ; and as we had people on the watch, 
who were ready to watch it into the houses, it came to this, 
we were prepared to bring our actions against certain indi- 
viduals, after sitting, perhaps, from three to four months 
every week, which we did at the Crown and Anchor in the 
Strand, but we did not proceed with our actions, to prevent 
ill blood in the trade. We regulariy met, and, as we con- 
ceived at the time, formed a committee of the most respect- 
able of the trade. I was secretary of that committee. The 
game was sold in the city, in the vicinity of the Royal Ex- 
change, cheaper than ever was known, because the people 
at our end of the town were afraid. I, as a point of hon- 
our, never had it in my house. I never had a head of 
dame in my house that season. — What was the conse- 
quence ? I lost my trade, and gave offence to a gentleman ; 
a nobleman's steward, or butler, or cook, treated it as con- 
tumely ; " Good God, what is the use of your running your 
head against the wall ?" — You were obliged to begin the 
trade ag?>in ? Yes, and sold more than ever. — Report, p. 18. 

These consequences are confirmed by the evidence 
of q t . ery person before the committee. 

All the evidence is very strong as to the fact, that 
dealing in game is not discreditable ; that there are a 
great number of respectable persons, and, among the 
rest, the first poulterers in London, who buy game 
knowing it to have been illegally procured, but who 
would never dream of purchasing any other article 
procured by dishonesty. 

'Are there not, to your knowledge, a great many people 
in this town who deal in game, by buying or selling it, that 
would not on any account buy or sell stolen property ? — 
Certainly ; there are many capital tradesmen, poulterers, 
who deal in game, that would have nothing to do with at olea 



30 



WORKS OF THE REV. SIDNEY SMITH. 



property ; and yet I do not think there is a poulterer's shop 
in London where they could not get game, if they wanted 
it. — Do you think any discredit attaches to any man in this 
town for buying or selling game ? I think none at all : and 
I do not think that the men to whom I have just referred, 
would have any thing to do with stolen goods. — Would it 
not, in the opinion of the inhabitants of London, be con- 
sidered a very different thing dealing in stolen game, or sto- 
len poultry ? Certainly. — The one would be considered dis- 
graceful, and the other not ? Certainly ; they think nothing 
of dealing in game ; and the farmers in the country will not 
give information ; they will have a hare or two of the very 
men who work for them, and they are afraid to give us in- 
formation. — Report, p. 31. 

The evidence of Daniel Bishop, one of the Bow 
street officers, who has been a good deal employed in 
the apprehension of poachers, is curious and impor- 
tant, as it shows the enormous extent of the evil, and 
the ferocious spirit which the game laws engender in 
the common people. ' The poachers,' he says, 
1 came sixteen miles. The whole of the village from 
which they were taken were poachers ; the constable 
of the village, and the shoemaker, and other inhabi- 
tant* of the village. I fetched one man twenty-two 
miles. There was the son of a respectable gardener ; 
one of these was a sawyer, and another a baker, who 
kept a good shop there. If the village had been 
alarmed, we should have had some mischief; but we 
were all prepared with fire-arms. If poachers have a 
spite with the gamekeeper, that would induce them 
to go out in numbers to resist him. This party I 
speak of had something in their hats to distinguish 
them. They take a delight in setting to with the 
gamekeepers ; and talk it over afterwards how they 
served so and so. They fought with the butt-ends of 
their guns at Lord Howe's; they beat the game- 
keepers shockingly.' ' Does it occur to you (Bishop 
is asked) to have had more applications, and to have 
detected more persons this season than in any former 
one? Yes: I think within four months there have 
been twenty-one transported that I have been at the 
taking of, and through one man turning evidence in 
each case, and without that they could not have been 
identified ; the gamekeepers could not, or would not, 
identify them. The poachers go to the public house 
and spend their money ; if they have a good night's 
work, they will go and get drunk with the money. 
The gangs are connected together at different public 
houses, just like a club at a public house ; they are 
sworn together. If the keeper took one of them, they 
would go and attack him for so doing.' 

Mr. Stafford, chief clerk of Bow Street, says, < All 
the offences against the game laws which are of an 
atrocious description I think are generally reported to 
the public office in Bow Street, more especially in ca- 
ses where the keepers have either been killed, or dan- 
gerously wounded, and the assistance of an officer 
from Bow Street is required. The applications have 
been much more numerous of late years* than they 
were formerly. Some of them have been cases of 
murder ; but I do not think many have amounted to 
murder. There are many instances in which keepers 
have been very ill treated — they have been wounded, 
skulls have been fractured, and bones broken; and 
they have been shot at. A man takes an hare, or a 
pheasant, with a very different feeling from that with 
which he would take a pigeon or a fowl out of a farm- 
yard. The number of persons that assembled togeth- 
er is more for the purpose of protecting themselves 
against those that may apprehend them, than from 
any idea that they are actually committing depreda- 
tion upon the property of another person ; they do not 
consider it as property. I think there is a sense of 
morality and a distinction of crime existing in the 
men's minds, although they are mistaken about it. 
Men feel that if they go in a great body together, to 

* It is only of late years that men have been transported 
for shooting at night. There are instances of men who 
have been transported at the Sessions for night poaching, 
who made no resistance at all when taken ; but then their 
characters as old poachers weighed against them— characters 
estimated probably by the very lords of manors who had 
lo6t their game. This disgraceful law is the occasion of all 
the murders committed for game. 



break into a house, or to rob a person, or to steal his 
poultry, or his sheep, they are committing a crime 
against that man's property ; but I think with respect 
to the game, they do not feel that they are doing any 
thing which is wrong ; but think they have commit- 
ted no crime when they have done the thing, and their 
only anxiety is to escape detection ' In addition, Mr. 
Stafford states that he remembers not one single con- 
viction under Mr. Bankes's Act against buying game ; 
and not one conviction for buying or selling game 
within the last year has been made at Bow Street. 

The inferences from these facts are exactly as we 
predicted, and as every man of common sense must 
have predicted — that to prevent the sale of game is ab 
solutely impossible. If game is plentiful, and cannot 
be obtained at any lawful market, an illicit trade will 
be established, which it is utterly impossible to pre- 
vent by any increased severity of the laws. There 
never was a more striking illustration of the necessity 
of attending to public opinion in all penal enactments. 
Mr. Bankes (a perfect representation of all the ordina- 
ry notions about forcing mankind by pains and penal- 
ties) took the floor. To buy a partridge (though still 
considered as inferior to murder) was visited with the 
very heaviest infliction of the law ; and yet, though 
game is sold as openly in London as apples and oran- 
ges, though three years have elapsed since this legi- 
slative mistake, the officers can hardly recollect a 
single instance where the information has been laid, 
or the penalty levied : and why? because every man's 
feelings and every man's understanding tell him, that 
it is a most absurd and ridiculous tyranny to prevent 
one man, who has more game than he wants, from ex- 
changing it with another man, who has more money 
than he wants — because magistrates will not (if they 
can avoid it) inflict such absurd penalties — because 
even common informers know enough of the honest 
indignation of mankind, and are too well aware of the 
coldness of pump and pond to act under the bill of the 
Lycurgus of Corfe Castle. 

The plan now proposed is, to undersell the poacher, 
which may be successful or unsuccessful; but the 
threat is, if you attempt this plan there will be no 
game — and if there is no game there will be no coun- 
try gentlemen. We deny every part of this enthy- 
meme — the last proposition as well as the first. We 
really cannot believe that all our rural mansions would 
be deserted, although no game was to be found in their 
neighbourhood. Some come into the country for 
health, some for quiet, for agriculture, for economy, 
from attachment to family estates, from love of re- 
tirement, from the necessity of keeping up provincial 
interests, and from a vast variety of causes. Patridg- 
es and pheasants, though they form nine-tenths of hu- 
man motives, still leave a small residue, which may 
be classed under some other head. Neither is a great 
proportion of those whom the love of shooting brings 
into the country of the smallest value or importance 
to the country. A colonel of the Guards, the second 
son just entered at Oxford, three diners out from 
Piccadilly — Major Rock, Lord John, Lord Charles, 
the colonel of the regiment quartered at the neigh- 
bouring town, two Irish peers, and a German baron ; 
— if all this honourable company proceed with fustian 
jackets, dog- whistles, and chemical inventions, to a 
solemn destruction of pheasants, how is the country 
benefited by their presence? or how would earth, air, 
or sea, be injured by their annihilation ? There are 
certainly many valuable men brought into the country 
by a love of shooting, who, coming there for that pur- 
pose, are useful for many better purposes ; but a vast I 
multitude of shooters are of no more service to the 
country than the ramrod which condenses the charge, 
or the barrel which contains it. We do not deny that 
the annihilation of the game laws would thin the aris- 
tocratical population of the country ; but it would not 
thin that population so much as is contended ; and the 
loss of many of the persons so banished would be a 
good rather than a misfortune. At all events, we 
cannot at all comprehend the policy of alluring the bet- 
ter classes of society into the country, by the tempta- 
tion of petty tyranny and injustice, or of monopoly ini 
sports. How absurd it would be to offer to the higher 



GAME LAWS. 



13i 



orders the exclusive use of peaches, nectarines, and 
apricots, as the premium of rustication — to put vast 
quantities of men into prison as apricot eaters, apricot 
buyers, and apricot sellers — to appoint a regular day 
for beginning to eat, and another for leaving off — to 
lave a lord of the manor for green gages — and to rage 
with a penalty of five pounds against the unqualified 
eater of the gage ! And yet the privilege of shooting 
a set of wild poultry is stated to be the bonus for the 
residence of country gentlemen. As far as this im- 
mense advantage can be obtained without the sacrifice 
of justice and reason, well and good — but we would 
not oppress any order of society, or violate right and 
wrong, to obtain any population of squires, however 
dense. The law is absurd and unjust ; but it must not 
be altered, because the alteration would drive men 
out of the country ! If gentlemen cannot breathe 
fresh air without injustice, let them putrefy in Cran- 
borne Alley. Make just laws, and let squires live and 
die where they please. 

The evidence collected in the House of Commons 
respecting the Game Laws is so striking and so deci- 
sive against the gentlemen of the trigger, that their 
only resource is to represent it as not worthy of belief. 
But why not worthy of belief? It is not stated what 
part of it is incredible. Is it the plenty of game in 
London for sale ? the unfrequency of convictions ? the 
occasional but frequent excess of supply above de- 
mand in an article supplied by stealing ? or its de- 
struction when the sale is not without risk, and the 
price extremely low? or the readiness of grandees to 
turn the excess of their game into fish or poultry? 
All these circumstances appear to us so natural and 
so likely, that we should, without any evidence, have 
but little doubt of their existence. There are a few 
absurdities in the evidence of one of the poulterers ; 
but, with this exception, we see no reason whatever 
for impugning the credibility and exactness of the 
mass of testimony prepared by the committee 

It is utterly impossible to teach the common people 
to respect property in animals bred the possessor 
knows not where — which he cannot recognise by any 
mark, which may leave him the next moment, which 
are kept, not for profit, but for amusement. Opinion 
never will be in favour of such property ; if the animus 
fur audi exists, the propensity will be gratified by 
poaching. It is in vain to increase the severity of the 
protecting laws. They make the case weaker, in- 
stead of stronger ; and are more resisted and worse 
executed, exactly in proportion as they are contrary to 
public opinion : — the case of the game laws is a me- 
morable lesson upon the philosophy of legislation. If 
a certain degree of punishment does not cure the of- 
fence, it is supposed, by the Bankes' School, that 
there is nothing to be done but to multiply this pun- 
ishment by two, and then again and again, till the ob- 
ject is accomplished. The efficient maximum of pun- 
ishment, however, is not what the legislature chooses 
to enact, but what the great mass of mankind think the 
maximum ought to be. The moment the punishment 
passes this Rubicon, it becomes less and less, instead 
of greater and greater. Juries and magistrates will 
not commit — informers* are afraid of public indigna- 
tion — poachers will not submit to be sent to Botany 
Bay without a battle— blood is shed for pheasants — 
the public attention is called to this preposterous 
state of the law — and even ministers — (whom nothing 

{>esters so much as the interests of humanity) are at 
east compelled to come forward and do what is right. 
Apply this to the game laws. It was before penal to 
sell game : within these few years, it has been made 
penal to buy it. From the scandalous cruelty of the 
law, night poachers are transported for seven years. 

* There is a remarkable instance of this in the new Turn- 
pike Act. The penalty for taking more than the legal num- 
ber of outside passengers is ten pounds per head, if the coach- 
man is in part or wholly the owner. This will rarely be levi- 
ed ; because it is too much. A penalty of 100Z. would produce 
perfect impunity. The maximum of practical severity would 
have been about five pounds. Any magistrate would cheer- 
fully levy this sum ; while doubling it will produce reluctance 
in the judge, resistance in the culprit, and unwillingness in 
the informer. 



And yet, never was so much game sold, or such a spi- 
rit of ferocious resistance excited to the laws. One 
fourth of all the commitments in Great Britain are for 
offences against the game laws. There is a general 
feeling that some alteration must take place — a feel- 
ing not only among Reviewers, who never see nor eat 
game, but among the double-barrelled, shot-belted 
members of the House of Commons, who are either 
alarmed or disgusted by the vice and misery which 
their cruel laws and childish passion for amusement 
are spreading among the lower orders of mankind. 

It is said, < In spite of all the game sold, there is 
game enough left ; let the laws therefore remain as 
they are ;' and so it was said formerly, ' There is su- 
gar enough ; let the slave trade remain as it is.' But 
at what expense of human happiness is this quantity 
of game or of sugar, and this state of poacher law and 
slave law, to remain 7 The first object of a good go- 
vernment is not that rich men should have their plea- 
sures in perfection, but that all orders of men should 
be good and happy ; and if crowded covies and chuck- 
ling cock-pheasants are only to be procured by encour- 
aging the common people in vice, and leading them 
into cruel and disproportionate punishment, it is the 
duty of the government to restrain the cruelties which 
the country members, in reward for their assiduous 
loyalty, have been allowed to introduce into the game 
laws. • 

The plan of the new bill (long since anticipated, in 
all its provisions, by the acute author of the pamphlet 
before us,) is, that the public at large should be sup- 
plied by persons licensed by magistrates, and that all 
qualified persons should be permitted to sell their game 
to these licensed distributors ; and there seems a fair 
chance that such a plan would succeed. The questions 
are, Would sufficient game come into the hands of the 
licensed salesman ? Would the licensed salesman con- 
fine himself to the purchase of game from qualified per- 
sons ? Would buyers of game purchase elsewhere than 
from the licensed salesman ? Would the poacher be un- 
dersold by the honest dealer ? Would game remain in 
the same plenty as before ? It is understood that the 
game laws are to remain as they are ; with this only 
difference, that the qualified man can sell to the li- 
censed man, and the licentiate to the public. 

It seems probable to us, that vast quantities of game 
would after a little time, find their way into the hands 
of licensed poulterers. Great people are often half 
eaten up by their establishments. The quantity of 
game killed in a large shooting party is very great ; 
to eat it is impossible, and to dispose of it in presents 
very troublesome. The preservation of game is very 
expensive ; and, when it could be bought, it would be 
no more a compliment to send it as a present than it 
would be to send geese and fowls. If game were sold, 
very large shooting establishments might be made to 
pay their own expenses. The shame is made by the 
law ; there is a disgrace in being detected and fined. 
If that barrier were removed, superfluous partridges 
would go to the poulterers as readily as superfluous 
venison does to the venison butcher — or as a gentle- 
man sells the corn and mutton off his farm which he 
cannot consume. For these reasons, we do not doubt 
that the shops of licensed poulterers would be full of 
game in the season ; and this part of the argument, we 
think, the arch enemy, Sir John Shelley, himself would 
concede to us. 

The next question is, From whence would they pro- 
cure it ? A license for selling game, granted by coun- 
try magistrates, would from their jealousy upon these 
subjects, be granted only to persons of some respecta- 
bility and property. The purchase of game from un- 
qualified persons would, of course, be guarded against 
by very heavy penalties, both personal and pecuniary ; 
and these penalties would be inflicted, because opinion 
would go with them. ' Here is a respectable trades- 
man,' it would be said, ' who might have bought as 
much game as he pleased in a lawful manner, but who 
in order to increase his profits by buying it a littb. 
cheaper, has encouraged a poacher to steal it.' Public 
opinion, therefore, would certainly be in favour of a. 
very strong punishment ; and a licensed vender of 
game, who exposed himself to these risks, would e» 



132 



WORKS OF THE REV. SIDNEY SMITH. 



pose himselt to the loss of liberty, property, character, 
and license. The persons interested to put a stop to 
such a practice, would not be the paid agents of go- 
vernment, as in cases of smuggling ; but all the gentle- 
men of the country, the customers of the tradesman 
for fish, poultry, or whatever else he dealt in, would 
have an interest in putting down the practice. In 
all probability, the practice would become disrepu- 
table, like the purchase of stolen poultry ; and this 
would be a stronger barrier than the strongest laws. A 
few shabby people would, for the chance of gaining 
sixpence, incur the risk of ruin and disgrace ; but it is 
probable that the general practice would be otherwise. 

For the same reasons, the consumers of game would 
rather give a little more for it to a licensed poulterer, 
than expose themselves to severe penalties by purcha- 
sing from a poacher. The great mass of London con- 
sumers are supplied now, not from shabby people, in 
whom they can have no confidence — not from hawkers 
and porters, but from respectable tradesmen, in whose 
probity they have the most perfect confidence. Men 
will brave the law for pheasants, bnt not for sixpence 
or a shilling ; and the law itself is much more difficult 
to be braved, when it allows pheasants to be bought 
at some price, than when it endeavours to render them 
utterly inaccessible to wealth. All the licensed sales- 
men, too, would have a direct interest in stopping the 
contraband trade of game. They would lose no cha- 
racter in doing so ; their informations would be rea- 
sonable and respectable. 

If all this is true, the poacher would have to com- 
pete with a great mass of game fairly and honestly 
poured into the market. He would be selling with a 
rope about his neck, to a person who bought with a 
rope about his neck ; his description of customers 
would be much the same as the customers for stolen 
poultry, and his profits would be very materially 
abridged. At present, the poacher is in the same 
situation as the smuggler would be, if rum and brandy 
could not be purchased of any fair trader. The great 
check to the profits of the smuggler are, that, if you 
want his commodities, and will pay an higher price, 
you may have them elsewhere without risk or dis- 
grace. But forbid the purchase of these luxuries at 
any price. Shut up the shop of the brandy merchant, 
and you render the trade of the smuggler of incalcu- 
able value. The object of the intended bill is, to raise 
up precisely the same competition to the trade of the 
poacher, by giving the public an opportunity of buy- 
ing lawfully and honestly the tempting articles in 
which he now deals exclusively. Such an improve- 
ment would not, perhaps, altogether annihilate his 
trade ; but it would, in all probability, act as a very 
material check upon it. 

The predominant argument against all this is, that 
the existing prohibition against buying game, though 
partially violated, does deter many persons from com- 
ing into the market ; that if this prohibition were re- 
moved, the demand for game woujd be increased, the 
legal supply would be insufficient, and the residue 
would, and must be, supplied by the poacher, whose 
trade would, for these reasons, be as lucrative and 
flourishing as before. But it is only a few years since 
the purchase of game has been made illegal ; and the 
market does not appear to have been at all narrowed 
by the prohibition ; not one head of game the less has 
been sold by the poulterers ; and scarcely one single 
conviction has taken place under that law. How, 
then, would the removal of the prohibition, and the 
alteration of the law, extend the market, and increase 
the demand, when the enactment of the prohibition 
has had no effect in narrowing it ? But if the demand 
increases, why not the legal supply also ? Game is 
"increased upon an estate by feeding them in winter, 
by making some abatement to the tenants for guard- 
ing against depredations, by a large apparatus of 
gamekeepers and spies — in short, by expense. But if 
this pleasure of shooting, so natural to country gentle- 
men, is made to pay its own expenses, by sending 
superfluous game to market, more men, it is reason- 
able to suppose, will thus preserve and augment their 
name. The love of pleasure and amusement will pro- 
duce in the owners of game that desire to multiply 



game, which the love of gain does in the farmer to 
multiply poultry. Many gentlemen of small fortune 
will remember, that they cannot enjoy to any extent 
this pleasure without this resource ; that the legal 
sale of poultry will discountenance poaching ; and 
they will open an account with the poulterer, not to 
get richer, but to enjoy a great pleasure without an 
expense, in which, upon other terms, they could not 
honourably and conscientiously indulge. If country 
gentlemen of moderate fortune will do this (and we 
think after a little time they will do it), game may 
be multiplied and legally supplied to any extent. 
Another keeper, and another bean-stack, will produce 
their proportionable supply of pheasants. The only 
reason why the great lord has more game per acre 
than the little squire is, that he spends more money 
per acre to preserve it. 

For these reasons, we think the experiment of lega- 
lizing the sale of game ought to be tried. The game 
laws have been carried to a pitch of oppression which 
is a disgrace to the country. The prisons are half 
filled with peasants, shut up for the irregular slaughter 
of rabbits and birds — a sufficient reason for killing a 
weasel, but not for imprisoning a man. Something 
should be done ; it is disgraceful to a government to 
stand by, and see such enormous evils without inter- 
ference. It is true, they are not connected with the 
struggles of party ; but still, the happiness of the 
common people, whatever gentlemen may say, ought 
every now and then to be considered. 



CRUEL TREATMENT OF UNTRIED PRISON- 
ERS. (Edinburgh Review, 1824.) 

1. Letter to the Right Honourable Robert Peel, one of Hi# 
Majesty's Principal Secretaries of State, &fc. fyc. fyc. on 
Prison Labour. By John Headlam, M. A., Chairman of 
the Quarter Sessions for the North Riding of the County of 
York. London. Hatchard & Son, 1823. 

2. Information and Observations, respecting- the proposed 
Improvements at York Castle. Printed by Order of the 
Committee of Magistrates. September, 1323. 

It has been the practice, all over England, for these 
last fifty years,* not to compel prisoners to work be- 
fore guilt was proved. Within these last three or four 
years, however, the magistrates of the North Riding 
of Yorkshire, considering it improper to support any 
idle person at the county expense, have resolved, that 
prisoners committed to the house of correction for 
trial, and requiring county support, should work for 
their livelihood ; and no sooner was the treadmill 
brought into fashion, than that machine was adopted 
in the North Riding as the species of labour by which 
such prisoners were to earn their maintenance. If 
these magistrates did not consider themselves empow- 
ered to burden the county rates for the support of pri- 
soners before trial, who would not contribute to support 
themselves, it does not appear, from the publication 
of the reverend chairman of the sessions, that any 
opinions of counsel were taken as to the legality of so 
putting prisoners to work, or of refusing them mainte- 
nance if they choose to be idle ; but the magistrates 
themselves decided that such was the law of the land. 
Thirty miles off, however, the law of the land was dif- 
ferently interpreted ; and in the Castle of York large 
sums were annually expended in the maintenance of 
idle prisoners before trial, and paid by the different 
Ridings, without remonstrance or resistance.! 

Such was the state of affairs in the county of York 
before the enactment of the recent prison bill. After 
that period, enlargements and alterations were neces- 
sary in the county jail ; and it was necessary also for 
these arrangements, that the magistrates should know 
whether or not they were authorized to maintain such 



* Headlam, p. 6. 

t We mention the cases of the North Riding, to convince our 
readers that the practice of condemning prisoners to work 
before trial has existed in some parts of England; for in ques- 
tions like this we have always found it more difficult to prove 
the existence of the facts, than to prove that they were mi* 
chievoue and unjust. 



CRUEL TRAETMENT OF UNTRIED PRISONERS. 



133 



prisoners at the expense of the county, as, being ac- 
counted able and unwilling to work, still claimed the 
county allowance To questions proposed upon these 
points to three barristers the following answers were 
returned : — 

*2dly, I am of opinion, that the magistrates are empowered, 
and are compelled to maintain, at the expense of the county, 
such prisoners before trial as are able to work, unable to main- 
tain themselves, and not willing to work ; and that they have 
not the power of compelling such prisoners to work, either at 
the treadmill, or any other species of labour. 

J. Gubney. 

' Lincoln's Inn Fields, 2d Sejpfem&er,1823.' 

' I think the magistrates are empowered, under the tenth 
section (explained by the 37th and 38th), to maintain prisoners 
before trial, who are able to work, unable to maintain them- 
selves by their own means, or by employment which they 
themselves can procure, and not willing to work ; and I think 
also, that the words " shall be lawful," in that section, do not 
leave them a discretion on the subject, but are compulsory. 
Such prisoners can only be employed in prison labour with 
their own consent; and it cannot be intended that the justices 
may force such consent, by withholding from them the neces- 
saries of life, if they do not give it. Even those who are con- 
victed cannot be employed at the treadmill, which I consider 
as a species of severe labour. J. Parke. 

' September ith, 1823.' 

'2dly, As to the point of compelling prisoners confined on 
criminal charges, and receiving relief from the magistrates, to 
reasonable labour; to that of the treadmill for instance, in 
which, when properly conducted, there is nothing severe or 
unreasonable ; had the question arisen prior to the act, I should 
with confidence have said, I thought the magistrates had a 
compulsory power in this respect. Those who cannot live 
without relief in a jail, cannot live without labour out of it. 
Labour then is their avocation. Nothing is so injurious to the 
morals and habits of the prisoner as the indolence prevalent in 
prisons ; nothing so injurious to good order in the prison. The 
analogy between this and other cases of public support is ex- 
ceedingly strong ; one may almost consider it a general prin- 
ciple, that those who live at the charge of the community shall, 
as far as they are able, give the community a compensation 
through their labor. But the question does not depend on 
mere abstract reasoning. The stat. 19 Ch. 2, c. 4, sec. 1, enti- 
tled "An act for Relief of poor Prisoners, and setting them on 
work," speaks of persons committed for felony and other mis- 
demeanours to the common jail, who many times perish before 
trial; and then proceeds as to setting poor prisoners on work. 
Then stat. 31 G. 3, c. 46, sec. 13, orders money to be raised for 
such prisoners of every description, as being confined within 
the said jails, or other places of confinement, are not able to 
work. A late stat. (52 G. 2, c. 160) orders parish relief to such 
debtors on mesne process in jails not county jails, as are not 
able to support themselves; but says nothing of finding or 
compelling work. Could it be doubted, that if the justices 
were to provide work, and the prisoner refused it, such 
debtors might, like any other parish paupers, be refused the 
relief mentioned by the statute 1 In all the above cases, the 
authority to insist on the prisoner's labour, as the condition and 
consideration of relief granted him, is, I think, either expressed 
or necessarily implied; and thus, viewing the subject, I think 
it was in the power of magistrates, prior to the late statute, to 
compel prisoners, subsisting in all or in part on public relief, 
to work at the treadmill. The objection commonly made is, that 
prisoners, prior to trial, are to be accounted innocent, and to be 
detained, merely that they may be secured for trial : to this the 
answer is obvious, that the labour is neither meant as a punish- 
ment or a disgrace, but simply as a compensation for the relief, 
at their own request, afforded them. Under the present statute, 
I, however, have no doubt, that poor prisoners are entitled to 
public support, and that there can be no compulsory labour 
prior to trial. The two statutes adverted to (19 Ch. 2, c. 4, 
and 31 G. 3) are, as far as the subject is concerned, expressly 
repealed. The legislature then had in contemplation the 
existing power of magistrates to order labour before trial, and 
having it in contemplation, repeals it ; substituting (sec. 38) a 
power of setting to labour, only sentenced persons. The 13th 
rule, too, (p. 177) speaks of labour as connected with convicted 
prisoners, and sec. 37 speaks in general terms of persons com- 
mitted for trial, as labouring with their own consent. In op- 
position to these clauses, I think it impossible to speak of im- 
plied power, or power founded on general reasoning or ana- 
logy. So strong, however, are the arguments in favour of a 
more extended authority in justices of the peace, that it is 
scarcely to be doubted, that Parliament, on a calm revision of 
the subject, would be willing to restore, in a more distinct 
manner than it has hitherto been enacted, a general discretion 
on the subject. Were this done, there is one observation I will 
venture to make, which is, that should some unfortunate asso- 
ciation of ideas render the treadmill a matter of ignominy to 
common feelings, an enlightened magistracy would scarcely 



compel an untried prisoner to a species of labour which would 
disgrace him in his own mind, and in that of the public 
« York, August 21th, 1823.' S. W. Nicoll. 

In consequence, we believe, of these opinions, the 
North Riding magistrates, on the 13th of October (the 
new bill commencing on the 1st of September), passed 
the fohowing resolution : — ' That persons committed 
for trial, who are able to work, and have the means of 
employment offered them by the visiting magistrates, 
by which they may earn their support, but who obsti- 
nately refuse to work, shall be allowed bread and wa- 
ter only.' 

By this resolution they admit, of course, that the 
counsel are right hi their interpretation of the present 
law ; and that magistrates are forced to maintain pris- 
oners before trial who do not choose to work. The 
magistrates say, however, by their resolution, that 
the food shall be of the plainest and humblest kind, — 
bread and water; meaning, of course, that such pri- 
soners should have a sufficient quantity of bread and 
water, or otherwise the evasion of the law would be 
in the highest degree mean and reprehensible. But 
it is impossible to suppose any such thing to be inten- 
ded by gentlemen so highly respectable. Their inten- 
tion is not that idle persons before trial shall starve,— 
but that they shall have barely enough of the plainest 
food for the support of life and health. 

Mr. Headlam has written a pamphlet to show that 
the old law was very reasonable and proper ; that it is 
quite right that prisoners before trial, who are able to 
support themselves, but unwilling to work, should be 
compelled to work, and at the treadmill, or that ail 
support should be refused them. We are entirely of 
an opposite opinion ; and maintain that it is neither 
legal nor expedient to compel prisoners before trial to 
work at the treadmill, or at any species of labour, — 
and that those who refuse to work should be support- 
ed upon a plain healthy diet. We impute no sort of 
blame to the magistrates of the North Riding, or to 
Mr. Headlam, their chairman. We have no doubt but 
that they thought their measures the wisest and the 
best for correcting evil, and that they adopted them 
in pursuance of what they thought to be their duty. — 
Nor do we enter into any discussion with Mr. Head- 
lam, as chairman of a Quarter Sessions, but as the 
writer of a pamphlet. It is only in his capacity of 
author that we have any thing to do with him. In 
answering the arguments of Mr. Headlam, we shall 
notice, at the same time, a few other observations 
commonly resorted to in defence of a system which 
we believe to be extremely pernicious, and pregnant 
with the worst consequences ; and so thinking, we 
contend against it, and in support of the law as it now 
stands. 

We will not dispute with Mr. Headlam, whether 
his exposition of the old law is right or wrong ; be- 
cause time cannot be more unprofitably employed 
than in hearing gentlemen who are not lawyers dis- 
cuss points of law. We dare to say Mr. Headlam 
knows as much of the laws of his country as magis- 
trates in general do ; but he will pardon us for 
believing, that for the moderate sum of three guineas 
a much better opinion of what the law is now, or was 
then, can be purchased, than it is in the power of Mr. 
Headlam or of any county magistrate, to give for no- 
thing — Cuilibet in arte sua credendum est. It is con- 
cerning the expediency of such laws, and upon that 
point alone, that we are at issue with Mr. Headlam ; 
and do not let this gentleman suppose it to be any an- 
swer to our remarks to state what is done in the prison 
in which he is concerned, now the law is altered. The 
question is, whether he is right or wrong in his rea- 
soning upon what the law ought to be ; we wish to 
hold out such reasoning to public notice, and think it 
important it should be refuted — doubly important, 
when it comes from an author, the leader of the quo- 
rum, who may say with the pious JEneas, 

Quaeque ipse miserrima vidi, 

Et quorum pars magna fui. 

If, in this discussion, we are forced to insist upon 
the plainest and most elementary truths, the fault is 
not with us, but with those who forget them ; and 



84 



WORKS OF THE REV. SIDNEY SMITH. 



who refuse to be any longer restrained by those prin- 
tiples which have hitherto been held to be as clear as 
they are important to human happiness. 

To begin, then, with the nominative case and the 
verb — we must remind those advocates for the tread 
mill, a parte ante (for which the millers a parte post 
we have no quarrel) , that it is one of the oldest max- 
ims of common sense, common humanity, and common 
law, to consider every man as innocent till he is proved 
to be guilty ; and not only to consider him to be inno- 
cent, but to treat him as if he was so ; to exercise upon 
his case not merely a barren speculation, but one 
which produces practical effects, and which secures to 
a prisoner the treatment of an honest, unpunished 
man. Now, to compel prisoners before trial to work 
at the treadmill, as the condition of their support, 
must, in a great number of instances, operate as a 
very severe punishment. A prisoner may be a tailor, 
a watchmaker, a bookbinder, a printer, totally unac- 
customed to any such species of labour. Such a man 
may be cast into jail at the end of August,* and not 
tried till the March following, is it no punishment 
to such a man to walk up hill like a turnspit dog, in 
an infamous machine, for six months? and yet there 
are gentlemen who suppose that the common people 
do not consider this as punishment ! — that the gayest 
and most joyous of human beings is a treader, untried 
by a jury of his countrymen, in the fifth month of 
lifting up the leg, and striving against the law of grav- 
ity, supported by the glorious iufonnation which he 
receives from the turnkey, that he has all the time 
been grinding flour on the other side of the wall ! If 
this sort of exercise, necessarily painful to sedentary 
persons, is agreeable to persons accustomed to labour, 
then make it voluntary — give the prisoners their choice 
— give more money and more diet to those who can 
and will labour at the treadmill, if the treadmill (now 
bo dear to magistrates) is a proper punishment for 
untried prisoners. The position we are contending 
ftgainst is, that all poor prisoners who are able to 
work should be put to work upon the treadmill, the 
inevitable consequence of which practice is, a repeti- 
tion of gross injustice by the infliction of undeserved 
punishment; for punishment, and severe punishment, 
to such persons as we have enumerated, we must con- 
sider it to be. 

But punishments are not merely to be estimated by 
pain to the limbs, but by the feelings of the mind. 
Gentlemen punishers are apt to forget that the com- 
mon people have any mental feelings at all, and think, 
if body and belly are attended to, that persons under 
a certain income have no right to likes and dislikes. 
The labour of the treadmill is irksome, dull, monoto- 
nous, and disgusting tn the last degree. A man does 
not see his work, does not know what he is doing, 
what progress he is making ; there is no room for art, 
contrivance, ingenuity, and superior skill — all which 
are the cheering circumstances of human labour. 
The husbandman sees the field gradually subdued by 
the plough ; the smith beats the rude mass of iron by 
degrees into its meditated shape, and gives it a medi- 
tated utility ; the tailor accommodates his parallelo- 
gram of cloth to the lumps and bumps of the human 
body, and, holding it up, exclaims, l This will contain 
the lower moiety of an human being.' But the treader 
does nothing but tread ; he sees no change of objects, 
admires no new relation of parts, imparts no new qual- 
ities to matter, and gives to it no new arrangements 
and positions ; or, if he does, he sees and knows it not, 
but is turned at once from a rational being, by a justice 
of peace, into a primum mobile, and put upon a level 
with a rush of water or a puff of steam. It is impos- 
sible to get gentlemen to attend to the distinction be- 
tween raw and roasted prisoners, without which all 
discussion on prisoners is perfectly ridiculous. No- 
thing can be more excellent than this kind of labour 

* Mr. Headlam, as we understand, would extend this labour 
to all poor prisoners before trial, in jails which are delivered 
twice a year at the assizes, as well as to houses of correction 
delivered four times a year at the Sessions ; i.e. not to extend 
the labonr, but to refuse all support to those who refuse the 
labour — a distinction, but not a difference. 



for persons to whom you mean to make labour as irk- 
some as possible ; but for this very reason, it is the 
labour to which an untried prisoner ought not to be 
put. 

It is extremely uncandid to say that a man is obsti- 
nately and incorrigibly idle, because he will not sub- 
mit to such tiresome and detestable labour as that of 
the treadmill. It is an old feeling among Englishmen 
that there is a difference between tried and untried 
persons, between accused and convicted persons. — 
These old opinions were in fashion before this new 
magistrate's plaything was invented ; and we are con- 
vinced that many industrious persons, feeling that 
they have not had their trial, and disgusted with the 
nature of the labour, would refuse to work at the 
treadmill, who would not be averse to join in any 
common and fair occupation. Mr. Headlam says, that 
labour may be a privilege as well as a punishment. — 
So may taking physic be a privilege, in cases where it 
is asked for as a charitable relief, but not if it is stuffed 
down a man's throat whether he say yea or nay. Cer- 
tainly labour is not necessarily a punishment : nobody 
has said it is so ; but Mr. Headlam's labour is a pun- 
ishment, because it is irksome, infamous, unasked for, 
and undeserved. This gentleman, however, observes, 
that committed persons have offended the laws ; and 
the sentiment expressed in these words is the true key 
to his pamphlet and his system — a perpetual tendency 
to confound the convicted and the accused. 

' With respect to those sentenced to labour as a punishment, 
I apprehend there is no difference of opinion. All are agreed 
that it is a great defect in any prison where such convicts are 
unemployed. But as to all other prisoners, whether debtors, 
persons committed for trial, or convicts not sentenced to hard 
labour, if they have no means of subsisting themselves, and 
must, if discharged, either labour for their livelihood or apply 
for parochial relief, it seems unfair to society at large, and 
especially to those who maintain themselves by honest indus- 
try, that those who, by offending the laws, have subjected them- 
selves to imprisonme7it, should be lodged, and clothed, and fed, 
without being called upon for the same exertions which other* 
have to use to obtain such advantages.' — Headlam, pp. 23, 24. 

Now nothing can be more unfair than to say that 
such men have offended the laws. That is the very 
question to be tried, whether they have offended the 
laws or not ? It is merely because this little circum- 
stance is taken for granted that we have any quarrel 
at all with Mr. Headlam and his school. 

' I can make,' says Mr. Headlam, ' every delicate considera- 
tion for the rare case of a person perfectly innocent being 
committed to jail on suspicion of crime. Such person is desc r- 
vedly an object of compassion, for having fallen under circum- 
stances which subject him to be charged with crime, and, con- 
sequently, to be deprived of his liberty : but if he has been in 
the habit of labouring for his bread before his commitment, 
there does not appear to be any addition to his misfortune in 
being called upon to work for his subsistence in prison.'— 
Headlam, p. 24. 

And yet Mr. Headlam describes this very punish- 
ment, which does not add to the misfortunes of an in- 
nocent man, to be generally disagreeable, to be dull, irk- 
some, to excite a strong dislike, to be a dull, monotonous 
labour, to be a contrivance which connects the idea of 
discomfort with a jail. (p. 36.) So that Mr. Headlam 
looks upon it to be no increase of an innocent man's 
misfortunes, to be constantly employed upon a dull, 
irksome, monotonous labour, which excites a strong 
dislike, and connects the idea of discomfort with a jail. 
We cannot stop, or stoop to consider, whether beating 
hemp is more or less dignified than working in a mill. 
The simple rule is this, — whatever felons do, men not 
yet proved to be felons should not be compelled to do. 
It is of no use to look into hvws become obsolete by 
alteration of manners. For these fifty years past, and 
before the invention of treadmills, untried men were 
not put upon felons' work ; but with the mill came in 
the mischief. Mr. Headlam asks, How can men be 
employed upon the ancient trades in a prison ? — cer- 
tainly they cannot ; but are human occupations so few, 
and is the ingenuity of magistrates and jailers so lim- 
ited, that no occupations can be found for innocent 
men, but those which are shameful and odious ? Does 
Mr. Headlam really believe, that grown up and bap- 



CRUEL TREATMENT OF UNTRIED PRISONERS. 



136 



tised persons are to be satisfied with such arguments, 
or repelled by such difficulties. ? 

It is some compensation to an acquitted person, 
that the labour he has gone through unjustly in jail 
has taught him some trade, given him an insight into 
some species of labour in which he may hereafter im- 
prove himself; but Mr. Headlam's prisoner, after a 
verdict of acquittal, has learnt no other art than of 
walking up hill ; he has nothing to remember or re- 
compense him but three months of undeserved and 
unprofi table torment. The verdict of the jury has 
pronounced him steady in his morals ; the conduct of 
the justices has made him stiff in his joints. 

But it is next contended by some persons, that the 
poor prisoner is not compelled to work, because he 
has the alternative of starving, if he refuses to work. 
You take up a poor man upon suspicion, deprive him 
of all his usual methods of getting his livelihood, and 
then giving him the first view of the treadmill, he of 
the quorum thus addresses him : — l My amiable friend, 
we use no compulsion with untried prisoners. You 
are free as air till you are found guilty ; only it is my 
duty to inform you , as you have no money of your 
own, that the disposition to eat and drink which you 
have allowed you sometimes feel, and upon which I 
do not mean to cast any degree of censure, cannot 
possibly be gratified but by constant grinding in this 
machine. It has its inconveniences, I admit; but 
balance them against the total want of meat and 
drink, and decide for yourself. You are perfectly at 
liberty to make your choice, and I by no means wish 
to influence your judgment.' But Mr. Nicoll has a 
curious remedy for all this miserable tyranny ; he says 
it is not meant as a punishment. But if I am conscious 
that I never have committed the offence, certain that 
I have never been found guilty of it, and find myself 
tossed into the middle of an infernal machine, by the 
folly of those who do not know how to use the power 
entrusted to them, is it any consolation to me to be 
told, that it is not intended as a punishment, that it is 
a lucubration of justices, a new theory of prison dis- 
cipline, a valuable county experiment going on at the 
expense of my arms, legs, back, feelings, character, 
and rights ? We must tie those prcegustant punishers 
down by one question. Do you mean to inflict any 
degree of punishment upon persons merely for being 
suspected? — or at least any other degree of punish- 
ment than that without which criminal justice cannot 
exist, detention ? If you do, why let any one out upon 
bail ? For the question between us is not, how suspec- 
ted persons are to be treated, and whether or not they 
are to be punished ; but how suspected poor persons 
are to be treated, who want county support in prison. 
If to be suspected is deserving of punishment, then no 
man ought to be let out upon bail, but every one should 
be kept grinding from accusation to trial; and so 
ought all prisoners to be treated for offences not bail- 
able, and who do not want the county allowance. And 
yet no grinding philosopher contends, that all suspec- 
ted persons should be put in the mill — but only those 
who are too poor to find bail, or buy provisions. 

If there are, according to the doctrines of the millers, 
to be two punishments, the first for being suspected of 
committing the offence, and the second for committing 
it, there should be two trials as well as two punish- 
ments. Is the man really suspected, or do his accusers 
only pretend to suspect him ? Are the suspecting of 
better character than the suspected ? Is it a light sus- 
picion which may be atoned for by grinding a peck a 
day ? Is it a bushel case ? or is it one deeply criminal, 
which requires the flour to be ground fine enough for 
French rolls ? But we must put an end to such ab- 
surdities. 

It is very untruly stated, that a prisoner, before 
trial, not compelled to work, and kept upon a plain 
diet, merely sufficient to maintain him in health, is 
better off than he was previous to his accusation ; and 
it is asked, with a triumphant leer, whether the situa- 
tion of any man ought to be improved, merely because 
he has become an object of suspicion to his fellow- 
creatures? This happy and fortunate man, however, 
is separated from his wife and family ; his liberty is 
taken away ; he is confined within four walls ; he has 



I the reflection that his family are existing upon a pre- 
carious parish support, that his little trade and pro 
perty are wasting, that his character has become is 
famous, that he has incurred ruin by the malice ot 
others, or by his own crimes, that in a few weeks he 
is to forfeit his life, or be banished from every thing 
he loves upon earth. This is the improved situation, 
and the redundant happiness which requires the penal 
circumvolutions of the justice's mill to cut oft so un- 
just a balance of gratification, and bring him a little 
nearer to what he was before imprisonment and accu- 
sation. It would be just as reasonable to say, that an 
idle man in a fever is better oft' than a healthy man 
who is well and earns his bread. He may be better 
off if you look to the idleness alone, though that 16 
doubtful ; but is he better off if all the aches, agonies 
disturbances, deliriums, and the nearness to death, 
are added to the lot ? 

Mr. Headlam's panacea for all prisoners before trial, 
is the treadmill : we beg his pardon — for all poor pri- 
soners; but a man who is about to be tried for his 
life, often wants all his leisure time to reflect upon 
his defence. The exertions of every man within the 
walls of a prison are necessarily crippled and impair- 
ed. What can a prisoner answer who is taken hot 
and reeking from the treadmill, and asked what he 
has to say in his defence ; his answer naturally is — * I 
have been grinding corn instead of thinking of my de- 
fence, and have never been allowed the proper leisure 
to think of protecting my character and my life.' This 
is a very strong feature of cruelty and tyranny in the 
mill. We ought to be sure that every man has had 
the fullest leisure to prepare for his defence, that his 
mind and body have not been harassed by vexatious 
and compulsory employment. The public purchase, 
at a great price, legal accuracy, and legal talent, to 
accuse a man who has not, perhaps, one shilling to 
spend upon his defence. It is atrocious cruelty not to 
leave him full leisure to write his scarcely legible let- 
ters to his witnesses and to use all the melancholy 
and feeble means which suspected poverty can employ 
for its defence against the long and heavy arm of 
power. 

A prisoner, upon the system recommended by Mr, 
Headlam, is committed, perhaps at the end of August, 
and brought to trial the March following ; and, after 
all, the bill is either thrown out by the grand jury, or 
the prisoner is fully acquitted ; and it has been found, 
we believe, by actual returns, that, of committed pri- 
soners, about a half are actually acquitted, or their ac- 
cusations dismissed by the grand jury. This maybe 
very true, say the advocates of this system, but we 
know that many men who are acquitted are guilty. 
They escape through some mistaken lenity of the law, 
or some corruption of evidence ; and as they have net 
had their deserved punishment after trial, we are not 
sorry they had it before. The English law says, 
better many guilty escape, than that one innocent man 
perish ; but the humane notions of the mill are bottom- 
ed upon the principle, that all had better be punished 
lest any escape. They evince a total mistrust in the 
jurisprudence of the country, and say the results of 
trial are so uncertain, that it is better to punish all the 
prisoners before they come into court. Mr. Headlam 
forgets that general rules are not beneficial in each in- 
dividual instance, but beneficial upon the whole ; that 
they are preserved because they do much more good 
than harm, though in some particular instances they 
do more harm than good ; yet no respectable man 
violates them on that account, but holds them sacred 
for the great balance of advantage they confer upon 
mankind. It is one of the greatest crimes, for instance, 
to take away the fife of a man ; yet there are many 
men whose death would be a good to society, rather 
than an evil. Every good man respects the property 
of others ; yet to take from a worthless miser, and to 
give it to a virtuous man in distress, would be an ad- 
vantage. Sensible men are never staggered when they 
see the exception. They know the importance of the 
rule, and protect it most eagerly at the very moment 
when it is doing more harm than good. The r lain rule 
of justice is, that no man should be punished till he it 
found guilty ; but because Mr. Headlam occasionally 



13b 



WORKS OFTHE REV. SIDNEY SMITH. 



sees a bad man acquitted under this rule, and sent out 
unpunished upon the world, he forgets all the general 
good and safety of the principle are debauched by the 
exception, ana applauds and advocates a system of 
prison discipline which renders injustice certain, in 
order to prevent it from being occasional. 

The meaning of all preliminary imprisonment is, 
that the accused person should be forthcoming at the 
time of trial. It was never intended as a punishment. 
Bail is a far better invention than imprisonment, in 
cases where the heavy punishment of the offence 
would not induce the accused person to run away from 
any bail. Now, let us see the enormous difference 
this new style of punishment makes between two 
men, whose only difference is, that one is poor and 
the other rich. A and B are accused of some bailable 
offence. A has no bail to offer, and no money to sup- 
port himself in prison, and takes, therefore, his four 
or five months in the treadmill. B gives bail, appears 
at his trial, and both are sentenced to two months' 
imprisonment. In this case, the one suffers three 
times as much as the other for the same offence : but 
suppose A is acquitted and B found guilty — the inno- 
cent man has then laboured in the treadmill five 
months because he was poor, and the guilty man 
labours two months because he was rich. We are 
aware that there must be, even without the tread- 
mill, a great and an inevitable difference between 
men (in pari delicto,) some of whom can give bail, 
and some not ; but that difference becomes infinitely 
more bitter and objectionable, in proportion as de- 
tention before trial assumes the character of severe 
and degrading punishment. 

If motion in the treadmill was otherwise as fasci- 
nating as millers describe it to be, still the mere de- 
gradation of the punishment is enough to revolt every 
feeling of an untried person. It is a punishment con- 
secrated to convicted felons — and it has every cha- 
racter that such" punishment ought to have. An un- 
tried person feels at once, in getting into the mill, 
that he is put to the labour of the guilty ; that a mode 
of employment has been selected for him, which ren- 
ders him infamous before a single fact or argument 
has been advanced to establish his guilt. If men are 
put into the treadmill before trial, it is literally of no 
sort of consequence whether they are acquitted or 
not. Acquital does not shelter them from punish- 
ment, for they have "already been punished. It does 
not screen them from infamy, for they have already 
been treated as if they were infamous ; and the asso- 
ciation of the treadmill and crimes is not to be got 
over. This machine flings all the power of juries 
into the hands of the magistrate, and makes every 
simple commitment more terrible than a conviction ; 
for. in a conviction, the magistrate considers whether 
the offence has been committed or not ; and does not 
send the prisoner to jail unless he thinks him guilty ; 
but in a simple commitment, a man is not sent to jail 
because the magistrate is convinced of his guilt, but 
because he thinks a fair question may be made to a 
jury whether the accused person is guilty or not. 
Still, however, the convicted and the suspected both 
go to the same mill ; and he who is there upon the 
doubt, grinds as much flour as the other whose guilt 
is established by a full examination of conflicting 
evidence. 

Where is the necessity for such a violation of com- 
mon sense and common justice ? Nobody asks for the 
idle prisoner before trial more than a very plain and 
moderate diet. Offer him, if you please, some labour 
which is less irksome, and less infamous than the 
treadmill — bribe him by improved diet, and a share 
of the earnings ; there will not be three men out of an 
hundred who would refuse such an invitation, and 
spurn at such an improvement of their condition. A 
little humane attention and persuasion, among men 
who ought, upon every principle of justice, to be con- 
sidered as innocent, we should have thought much 
more consonant to English justice, and to the feelings 
of English magistrates, than the rack and wheel of 
Cubitt.* 

• It is singular enough, that we use these observations iu 



Prison discipline is an object of considerable im 
portance ; but the common rights of mankind, and 
the common principles of justice, and humanity, and 
liberty, are of greater consequence even than prison 
discipline. Right and wrong, innocence and guilt, 
must not be confounded, that a prison-fancying justice 
may bring his friend into the prison and say, ' Look 
what a spectacle of order, silence, and decorum we 
have established here ! no idleness, all grinding ! — we 
produce a penny roll every second — our prison is sup- 
posed to be the best regulated prison in England — 
Cubitt is making us a new wheel of forty felon power 
— look how white the flour is, all done by untried pri- 
soners — as innocent as lambs !' If prison discipline 
is to supersede every other consideration, why are 
pennyless prisoners alone to be put into the mill be 
fore trial? If idleness in jails is so pernicious, why 
not put all prisoners in the treadmill, the rich as weii 
as those who are unable to support themselves ? Why 
are the debtors left out ? If fixed principles are to be 
given up, and prisons turned into a plaything for ma- 
gistrates, nothing can be more unpicturesque than to 
see one-half of the prisoners looking on, talking,. 
gaping, and idling, while their poorer brethren are 
grinding for dinners and suppers. 

It is a very weak argument to talk of the prisoner? 
earning their support, and the expense to a county of 
maintaining prisoners before trial — as if any rational 
man could ever expect to gain a farthing by an ex- 
pensive mill, where felons are the moving power, and 
justices the superintendents, or as if such a trade must 
not necessarily be carried on at a great loss. If it 
were just and proper that prisoners, before trial, 
should be condemned to the mill, it would be of no 
consequence whether the county gained or lost by 
the trade. But the injustice of the practice can never 
be defended by its economy; and the fact is, that it 
increases expenditure, while it violates principle. We 
are aware, that by leaving out repairs, alterations, 
and first costs, and a number of little particulars, a 
very neat account, signed by a jailer, may be made 
up, which shall make the mill a miraculous combina- 
tion of mercantile speculation and moral improve- 
ment ; but we are too old for all this. We accuse no- 
body of intentional misrepresentation. This is quite 
out of the question with persons so highly respectable : 
but men are constantly misled by the spirit of system, 
and egregiously deceive themselves — even very good 
and sensible men 

Mr. Headlam compares the case of a prisoner before 
trial, claiming support, to that of a pauper claiming 
relief from his parish. But it seems to us that no two 
cases can be more dissimilar. The prisoner was no 
pauper before you took him up, and deprived him of 
his customers, tools, and market. It is by your act 
and deed that he is fallen into a state of pauperism ; 
and nothing can be more preposterous, than first to 
make a man a pauper, and then to punish him for be- 
ing so. It is true, that the apprehension and deten- 
tion of the prisoner were necessary for the purposes of 
criminal justice ; but the consequences arising from 
this necessary act cannot yet be imputed to the pri- 
soner. He has brought it upon himself, it will be ur- 
ged ; but that remains to be seen, and will not be 
known till he is tried; and till it is known you have 
no right to take it for granted, and to punish him as if 
it were proved. 

There seems to be in the minds of some gentlemen 
a notion, that when once a person is in prison, it is ot 
little consequence how he is treated afterwards. The 
tyranny which prevailed, of putting a person in a par- 
ticular dress before trial, now abolished by act ot 
Parliament, was justified by this train of reasoning: — 
The man has been rendered infamous by imprison- 
ment. He cannot be rendered more so, dress him at. 
you will. His character is not rendered worse by the 
treadmill, than it is by being sent to the place where 
the treadmill is at work. The substance of this way 
of thinking is, that when a fellow-creature is in the 



reviewing the pamphlet and system of a gentleman remarka- 
ble for the urbanity of his manners, and the mildness and hu- 
manity of his disposition. 



AMERICA. 



137 



frying pan, there is no harm in pushing him into the 
fire ; that a little more misery — a little more infamy — 
a few more links are of no sort of consequence in a 
prison-life. If this monstrous style of reasoning ex- 
tended to hospitals as well as prisons, there would be 
no harm in breaking the small bone of a man's leg, — 
because the large one was fractured, or in peppering 
with small shot a person who was wounded with a 
cannon-ball. The principle is, because a man is very 
wretched there is no harm in making him a little 
more so. The steady answer to all this is, that a man 
is imprisoned before trial, solely for the purpose of se- 
curing his appearance at his trial; and that no punish- 
ment nor privation, not clearly and candidly necessary 
for that purpose, should be inflicted upon him. I keep 
you in prison, because criminal justice would be de- 
feated by your flight, if I did not : but criminal justice 
can go on very well without degrading you to hard and 
infamous labour, or denying you any reasonable grati- 
fication. For these reasons, the first of those acts is 
just, the rest are mere tyranny. 

Mr. Nicoll, in his opinion, tells us, that he has no 
doubt Parliament would amend the bill, if the omission 
was stated to them. We, on the contrary, have no 
manner of doubt that Parliament would treat such a 
petition with the contempt it deserved. Mr. Peel is 
too much enlightened and sensible to give any counte- 
nance to such a great and glaring error. In this case, 
— and we wish it were a more frequent one — the wis- 
dom comes from within, and the error from without 
the walls of Parliament. 

A prisoner before trial who can support himself, — 
ought to be allowed every fair and rational enjoyment 
which he can purchase, not incompatible with prison 
discipline. He should be allowed to buy ale or wine 
in moderation, — to use tobacco, or any thing else he 
can pay for within the above-mer tioned limits. If he 
cannot support himself, and declines work, then he 
should be supported upon a very plain, but still a plen- 
tiful diet (something better we think than bread and 
water) ; and all prisoners before trial should be allowed 
to work. By a liberal share of earnings (or rather by 
rewards, for there would be no earnings); and also by 
an improved diet, and in the hands of humane magis- 
trates,* there would soon appear to be no necessity for 
appealing to the treadmill till trial was over. 

This treadmill, after trial, is certainly a very excel- 
lent method of punishment, as far as we are yet ac- 
quainted with its effects. We think, at present, how- 
ever, it is a little absurd; and hereafter it is our 
intention to express our opinion upon the limits to 
which it ought to be confined. Upon this point, how- 
ever, we do not much differ from Mr. Headlam; — 
although, in his remarks on the treatment of prisoners 
before trial, we think he has made a very serious mis- 
take, and has attempted (without knowing what he 
was doing, and meaning, we are persuaded, nothing 
but what was honest and just) to pluck up one of the 
ancient landmarks of human justice .f 



* All magistrates should remember that nothing is more easy 
to a person intrusted with power than to convince himself it is 
his duty to treat his fellow-creatures with severity and rigour, 
—and then to persuade himself that he is doing it very reluc- 
tantly, and contrary to his real feeling. 

t We hope this article will conciliate our old friend, Mr. 
Roscoe — who is very angry with us for some of our former 
lucubrations on prison discipline, — and, above all, because we 
are not grave enough for him. The difference is thus stated : 
— Six ducks are stolen. Mr. Roscoe would commit the man to 
prison for six weeks, perhaps, — reason with him, argue with 
him, give him tracts, send clergymen to him, work him gently 
at some useful trade, and try to turn him from the habit of 
stealing poultry. We would keep him hard at work twelve 
hours every day at the treadmill, feed him only so as not to 
impair his health, and then give him as much of Mr. Roscoe's 
system as was compatible with our own ; and we think our 
method would diminish the number of duck-stealers more 
effectually than that of the historian of Leo X. The primary 
duck-stealer would, we think, be as effectually deterred from 
repeating the offence by the terror of our imprisonment, as by 
the excellence of Mr. Roscoe's education — and, what is of infi- 
nitely greater consequence, innumerable duck-stealers would 
be prevented. Because punishment does not annihilate crime, 
it is folly to say it does not lessen it. It did not stop the mur- 
der of Mrs. Donatty ; but how many Mrs. Donattys has it kept 



AMERICA. (Edinburgh Review.) 

1. Travels through Part of the United States and Canada, 
in 181S and 1819. By John M. Duncan, A. B. Glasgow, 
1823. 

2. Letters from North America, vyritten during a Tour in 
the United States and Canada. By Adam Hodgson. Lon- 
don, 1824. 

3. An Excursion through the United States and Canada, dur" 
ing the years 1822-3. By an English gentleman. Londoru 
1824. 

There is a set of miserable persons in England, who 
are dreadfully afraid of America and every thing Ame- 
rican — whose great delight is to see that country ridi- 
culed and vilified — and who appear to imagine that all 
the abuses which exist in this country acquire addi- 
tional vigour and chance of duration from every book 
of travels which pours forth its venom and falsehood 
on the United States. We shall from time to time call 
the attention of the public to this subject, not from 
any party spirit, but because we love the truth, and 
praise excellence wherever we find it ; and because we 
think the example of America, will in many instances 
tend to open the eyes of Englishmen to their true inte- 
rests. 

The economy of America is a great and important 
object for our imitation. The salary of Mr. Bagot, our 
late ambassador, was, we believe, rather higher than 
that of the President of the United States. The vice- 
president receives rather less than the second clerk of 
the House of Commons ; and all salaries civil and mi- 
litary, are upon the same scale ; and yet no country is 
better served than America ! Mr. Hume has at last 
persuaded the English people to look into their ac- 
counts, and see how sadly they are plundered. But we 
ought to suspend our contempt for America, and con- 
sider whether we have not a very momentous lesson 
to learn from this wise and cautious people on the 
subject of economy. 

A lesson upon the importance of religious toleration, 
we are determined, it would seem, not to learn,— either 
from America or any other quarter of the globe. The 
High Sheriff of New York last year was a Jew. It 
was with the utmost difficulty that a bill was carried 
this year to allow the first Duke of England to carry a 
gold stick before the king — because he was a Catholic ! 
— and yet we think ourselves entitled to indulge in im- 
pertinent sneers at America, — as if civilization did not 
depend more upon making wise laws for the promotion 
of human happiness, than in having good inns, and 
post-horses, and civil waiters. The circumstances of 
the Dissenters' marriage bill are such as would excite 
the contempt of a Choctaw or Cherokee, if he could be 
brought to understand them. A certain class of Dis- 
senters beg they may not be compelled to say that 
they marry in the name of the Trinity, because they 
do not believe in the Trinity. Never mind, say the 
corruptionists, you must go on saying you marry in the 



alive! When we recommend severity, we recommend, of 
course, that degree of severity which will not excite compas- 
sion for the sufferer, and lessen the horror of the crime. This 
is why we do not recommend torture and amputation of limbs. 
When a man has been proved to have committed a crime, it is 
expedient that society should make use of that man for the 
diminution of crime : he belongs to them for that purpose, 
Our primary duty, in such a case, is so to treat the culprit that 
many other persons may be rendered better, or prevented 
from being worse by dread of the same treatment ; and, 
making this the principal object, to combine with it as much 
as possible the improvement of the individual. The ruffian 
who killed Mr. Mumford was hung within forty-eight hours. 
Upon Mr. Roscoe's principles, this was wrong ; for it certainly 
was not the way to reclaim the man : — We say, on the contra- 
ry, the object was to do anything with the man which would 
render murders less frequent, and that the conversion of the 
man was a mere trifle compared to this. His death probably 
prevented the necessity of reclaiming a dozen murderers. 
That death will not, indeed, prevent all murders in that coun- 
ty ; but many who have seen it, and many who have heard of 
it, will swallow their revenge from the dread of being hanged. 
Mr. Roscoe is very severe upon our style ; but poor dear Mr. 
Roscoe should remember that men have different tastes, and 
different methods of going to work. We feel these matters m 
deeply tus he does. But why so cross upon thii «r any othef 
subject?- 



!38 



WORKS OF THE REV. SIDNEY SMITH. 



name of the Trinity, whether you believe in it or not. 
We know that such a protestation from you will be 
false : but, unless you make it, your wives shall be 
concubines, and your children illegitimate. Is it pos- 
sible to conceive a greater or more useless tyranny 
than this ? 

' In the religious freedom which America enjoys, I see a 
more unquestioned superiority. In Britain we enjoy tolera- 
tion, but here they enjoy liberty. If government has a 
right to grant toleration to any particular set of religious 
opinions, it has also a right to take it away; and such a 
right with regard to opinions exclusively religious I would 
deny in all cases, because totally inconsistent with the na- 
ture of religion, in the proper meaning of the word, and 
equally irreconcilable with civil liberty, rightly so called. 
God has given to each of us his inspired word, and a 
rational mind to which that word is addressed. He has 
also made known to us. that each for himself must answer 
at his tribunal for his principles and conduct. What man, 
then, or body of men, has a right to tell me, " You do not 
think aright on religious subjects, but we will tolerate your 
error?" The answer is a most obvious one, "Who gave 
you authority to dictate?— or what exclusive claim have 
you to infallibility?" If my sentiments do not lead me 
into conduct inconsistent with the welfare of my fellow- 
creatures, the question as to their accuracy or fallacy is one 
between God and my own conscience; and, though a fair 
subject for argument, is none for compulsion. 

< The Inquisition undertook to regulate astronomical 
science, and kings and parliaments have with equal pro- 
priety presumed to legislate upon questions of theology. 
The world has outgrown the former, and it will one day be 
ashamed that it has been so long of outgrowing the latter. 
The founders of the American republic saw the absurdity 
of employing the attorney-general to refute deism and in- 
fidelity, or of attempting to influence opinion on abstract 
subjects by penal enactment; they saw also the injustice of 
taking the whole to support the religious opinions of the 
few, and have set an example which older governments 
will one day or other be compelled to follow. 

'In America the question is not, What is his creed? — but, 
what is his conduct ? Jews have all the privileges of Chris- 
tians; Episcopalians, Presbyterians, and Independents, meet 
on common ground. No religious test is required to qualify 
for public office, except in some cases a mere verbal assent 
to the truth of the Christian religion; and in every court 
throughout the country, it is optional whether you give 
your affirmation or your oath.' — Duncan's Travels, II.32S — 
330. 

In fact, it is hardly possible for any nation to show 
a greater superiority over another than the Americans, 
in this particular, have done over this country. They 
have fairly, completely, and probably for ever, extin- 
guished that spirit of religious persecution which has 
been the employment and curse of mankind for four or 
five centuries, not only that persecution which impri- 
sons and scourges for religious opinions, but the tyran- 
ny of incapacitation, which, by disqualifying from civil 
offices, and cutting a man off from the lawful objects of 
ambition, endeavours to strangle religious freedom in 
silence, and to enjoy all the advantages without the 
blood, and noise , and fire of persecution. What passes 
in the mind of one mean blockhead is the general histo- 
ry of all persecution. < This man pretends to know bet- 
ter than me — I cannot subdue him by argument ; but I 
will take care he shall never be mayor or alderman of 
the town in which he lives ; I will never consent to the 
repeal of the test act or to Catholic emancipation ; I 
will teach the fellow to differ from me in religious 
opinions !' So says the Episcopalian to the Catholic 
—and so the Catholic says to the Protestant. But the 
wisdom of America keeps them all down— secures to 
them all their just rights— gives to each of them their 
separate pews, and bells, and steeples — makes them 
all aldermen in their turns— and quietly extinguishes 
the faggots which each is preparing for the combustion 
of the other. Nor is this indifference to religious sub- 
jects in the American people, but pure civilization — a 
thorough comprehension of what is best calculated to 
secure the public happiness and peace — and a determi- 
nation that this happiness and peace shall not be vio- 
lated by the insolence of any human being, in the garb, 
and under the sanction, of religion. In this particular, 
the Americans are at the head of all the nations of the 
world : and at the same time they are, especially in 
the Eastern and Midland States, so far from being 
indifferent on subjects of religion, that they may be 



j most justly characterized as a very religious people : 
but they are devout without being unjust (the great I 
J problem in religion); an higher proof of civilization 
than painted tea-cups, water-proof leather, or broad- 
cloth at two guineas a yard. 

America is exempted by its very newness as a na- 
tion, from many of the evils of the old governments of 
Europe. It has no mischievous remains of feudal in- 
stitutions, and no violations of political economy sanc- 
tioned by time, and older than the age of reason. If a 
man finds a partridge upon his ground eating his corn, 
in any part of Kentucky or Indiana, he may kill it, 
even if his father is not a doctor of divinity. The 
Americans do not exclude their own citizens from any 
branch of commerce which they leave open to all the 
rest of the world. 

1 One of them said, that he was well acquainted with a 
British subject, residing at Newark, Upper Canada, who 
annually smuggled from 500 to 1000 chests of tea into that I 
province from the United States. He mentioned the name 
of this man, who he said was growing very rich in conse- 
quence; and he stated the manner in which the fraud was 
managed. Now, as all the tea ought to be brought from 
England, it is of course very expensive ; and therefore the 
Canadian tea dealers, after buying one or two chests at 
Montreal or elsewhere, which have the custom-house mark . 
upon them, fill them up ever afterwards with tea brought I 
from the United States. It is calculated that near 10,000 
chests are annually consumed in the Canadas, of which not 
more than 2000 or 3000 come from Europe. Indeed, when 
I had myself entered Canada, I was told that of every fif- 
teen pounds of tea sold there, thirteen were smuggled. The 
profit upon smuggling this article is from 50 to 100 per cent., 
and with an extensive and wild frontier like Canada, can- 
not be prevented. Indeed it every year increases, and is 
brought to a more perfect system. But I suppose that the 
English government, which is the perfection of wisdom, 
will never allow the Canadian merchants to trade direct to 
China, in order that (from pure charity) the whole profit of 
the tea trade may be given up to the United States.' — Ex- 
cursion, pp. 394, 395. 

'You will readily conceive, that it is with no small morti- 
fication that I hear these American merchants talk of send- 
ing their ships to London and Liverpool, to take in goods 
or specie, with which to purchase tea for the supply of 
European ports, almost within sight of our own shores. 
They often taunt me, asking me what our government can 
possibly mean by prohibiting us from engaging in a profit- 
able trade, which is open to them and to all the world ? or 
where can be our boasted liberties, while we tamely submit 
to the infraction of our natural rights, to supply a monopoly 
as absurd as it is unjust, and to humour the caprice of a 
company who exclude their fellow-subjects from a branch 
of commerce which they do not pursue themselves, but 
leave to the enterprise of foreigners, or commercial rivals ? 
On such occasions I can only reply, that both our govern- 
ment and people are growing wiser; and that if the charter 
of the East India Company be renewed, when it next ex- 
pires, I will allow them to infer, that the people of England 
have little influence in the administration of their own 
affairs.'— H odgson's Letters, II. 128, 129. 

Though America is a confederation of republics, 
they are in many cases much more amalgamated than 
the various parts of Great Britain. If a citizen of the 
United States can make a shoe, he is at liberty to 
make a shoe any where between Lake Ontario and 
New Orleans, — he may sole on the Mississippi — heel 
on the Missouri — measure Mr. Birkbeck on the little 
Wabash, or take (which our best politicians do not 
find an easy matter), the length of Munroe's foot on 
the banks of the Potomac. But wo to the cobbler, 
who, having made Hessian boots for the aldermen of 
Newcastle, should venture to invest with these coria- 
ceous integuments the leg of a liege subject at York. 
A yellow ant in a nest of red ants — a butcher's dog in 
a fox-kennel — a mouse in a bee-hive, — all feel the ef- 
fects of untimely intrusion;— but far preferable their 
fate to that of the misguided artisan, who, misled by> 
sixpenny histories of England, and conceiving his 
country to have been united at the Heptarchy, goes 
forth from his native town to stich freely within the 
sea-girt limits of Albion. Him the mayor, him the 
alderman, him the recorder, him the quarter sessions 
would worry. Him the justices before trial would long 
to get into the treadmill ;* and would lament that, by 
di d d d 

* This puts us in mind of our friend Mr. Headlam, who: 
we hear, has written an answer to our Observations on the 



AMERICA. 



139 



a recent act, they could not do so, even with the in- 
truding tradesman's consent ; but the moment he was 
tried, they would push him in with redoubled energy, 
and leave him to tread himself into a conviction of 
the barbarous institutions of his corporation-divided 
country. 

Too much praise cannot be given to the Americans 
for their great attention to the subject of education. — 
All the public lands are surveyed according to the di- 
rection of Congress. They are divided into townships 
of six miles square, by lines running with the cardi- 
nal points, and consequently crossing each other at 
right angles. Every township is divided into 36 sec- 
tions, each a mile square, and containg 640 acres. One 
section in each township is reserved, and given in per- 
petuity for the benefit of common schools. In ad- 
dition to this, the states of Tennessee and Ohio have 
received grants for the support of colleges and acade- 
mies. The appropriation generally in the new states 
for seminaries of the higher orders, amounts to one- 
fifth of those for common schools. It appears from 
Seybert's Statistical Annals, that the land in the states 
and territories on the east side of the Mississippi, in 
which appropriations have been made, amounts to 
237,300 acres ; and according to the ratio above men- 
tioned, the aggregate on the east side of the Missis- 
sippi is 7,900,000. The same system of appropriation 
applied to the west, will make, for schools and colle- 
ges, 6,600,000 ; and the total appropriation for literary 
purposes, in the new states ana territories, 14,500,000 
acres, which, at two dollars per acre, would be 
29,000,000 dollars. These facts are very properly 
quoted by Mr. Hodgson ; and it is impossible to speak 
too highly of their value and importance. They quite 
put in the back ground every thing which has been 
done in the Old World for the improvement of the 
lower orders, and confer deservedly upon the Ameri- 
cans the character of a wise, a reflecting, and a virtu- 
ous people. 

It is rather surprising that such a people, spreading 
rapidly over so vast a portion of the earth, and culti- 
vating all the liberal and useful arts so successfully, 
should be so extremely sensitive and touchy as the 
Americans are said to be. We really thought at one 
time they would have fitted out an armament against 
the Edinburgh and Quarterly Reviews, and burnt down 
Mr. Murray's and Mr. Constable's shops, as we did 
the American Capitol. We, however, remember no 
other anti-American crime of which we were guilty, 
than a preference of Shakspeare and Milton over Joel 
Barlow and Timothy Dwight. That opinion we must 
still take the liberty of retaining. There is nothing in 
Dwight comparable to the finest passages of Paradise 
Lost, nor is Mr. Barlow ever so humorous or pathetic, 
as the great bard of the English stage is humorous or 
pathetic. We have always been strenuous* advocates 

Treadmill, before Trial. It would have been a very easy 
thing: for us to have hung Mr. Headlam up as a spectacle to 
the United Kingdoms of England, Scotland, and Ireland, 
the principality of Wales, and the town of Berwick-on- 
Tweed ; but we have no wish to make a worthy and res- 
pectable man ridiculous. For these reasons we have not 
even looked at his pamphlet, and we decline entering into 
a controversy upon a point, where, among men of sense 
and humanity (who have not heated themselves in the dis- 
pute,) there cannot possibly be any difference of opinion. 
All members of both houses of Parliament were unanimous 
in their condemnation of the odious and nonsensical prac- 
tice of working prisoners in the treadmill before trial. It 
had not one single advocate. Mr. Headlam and the magis- 
trates of the North Riding, in their eagerness to save a 
relic of their prison system, forgot themselves so far as to 
be entrusted with the power of putting prisoners to work 
before trial, with, their own consent — the legislature was, 
* We will not trust you,' — the severest practical rebuke 
ever received by any public body. We will leave it to 
others to determine whether it was deserved. We have no 
doubt the great body of magistrates meant well. They must 
have meant well — but they have been sadly misled, and 
have thrown odium on the subordinate administration of 
justice, which it is far from deserving on other occasions, 
in their hands. This strange piece of nonsense is, how- 
ever, now well ended — Requiescat in pace I 

* Ancient women, whether in or out of breeehes, will of 
course imagine that we are the enemies of the institutions of 
our country, because we are the admirers vf the institutions of 



for, and admirers cf, America— not taking our ideas 
from the overweeaimg vanity of the weaker part of the 
Americans themselves, but from what we have ob- 
served of their real energy or wisdom. It is very na- 
tural that we Scotch, who live in a little shabby scrag- 
gy corner of a remote island, with a climate which 
cannot ripen an apple, should be jealous of the aggres- 
sive pleasantry of more favoured people ; but that 
Americans, who have done so much for themselves, 
and received so much from nature, should be flung in- 
to such convulsions by English reviews and maga- 
zines, is really a bad specimen of Columbian juvenili- 
ty. We hardly dare to quote the following account of 
an American route, for fear of having our motives 
misrepresented, — and strongly suspect that there are 
but few Americans who could be brought to admit that 
a Philadelphia or Boston concern of this nature is not 
quite equal to the most brilliant assemblies of London 
or Paris. 

' A tea party is a serious thing in this country ; and some of 
those at whicji I have been present in New York and else- 
where, have been on a very large scale. In the modern houses 
the two principal apartments are on the first floor, and commu- 
nicated by large folding doors, which on gala days throw wide 
their ample portals, converting the two apartments into one. 
At the largest party which I have seen, there were about thirty 
young ladies present, and more than as many gentlemen. 
Every sofa, chair, and footstool were occupied by the ladies, 
and little enough room some of them appeared to have after 
all. The gentlemen were obliged to be content with walking 
up and down, talking now with one lady, now with another. 
Tea was brought in by a couple of blacks, carrying large trays, 
one covered with cups, the other with cake. Slowly making 
the round, and retiring at intervals for additional supplies, the 
ladies were gradually gone over ; and after much patience the 
gentlemen began to enjoy the beverage " which cheers but 
not inebriates ; " still walking about, or leaning against the 
wall, with the cup and saucer in their hand. 

• As soon as the first course was over, the hospitable trays 
again entered, bearing a chaos of preserves — peaches, pineap- 
ple?, ginger, oranges, citrons, pears, &c. in tempting display. 
A few of the young gentlemen now accompanied the revolution 
of the trays, and sedulously attended to the pleasure of the 
ladies. The party was so numerous that the period between 
the commencement and the termination of the round was suffi- 
cient to justify anew solicitation : and so the ceremony conti- 
nued, with very little intermission, during the whole evening. 
Wine succeeded the preserves, and dried fruit followed the 
wine, which, in its turn, was supported by sandwiches, in 
name of supper, and a forlorn hope of confectionary and frost- 
work. I pitied the poor blacks who, like Tantalus, had such a 
profusion of dainties the whole evening at their finger-ends, 
without the possibility of partaking of them. A little music 
and dancing gave variety to the scene, — which, to some of us, 
was a source of considerable satisfaction; for when a number 
of ladies were on the floor, those who cared not for the dance 
had the pleasure of getting a seat. About eleven o'clock I did 
myself the honour of escorting a lady home, and was well 
pleased to have an excuse for escaping.' — Duncan's Travels, 
II. 279, 280. 

The coaches must be given up ; so must the roads, 
and so must the inns. They are of course what these 
accommodations are in all new countries*, and much 
like what English great-grandfathers talk about as ex- 
isting in this country at the first period of their recol- 
lection. The great inconvenience of American inns, 
however, in the eyes of all Englishmen, is one which 
more sociable travellers must feel less acutely — we 
mean the impossibility of being alone, of having a 
room separate from the rest of the company. There 
is nothing which an Englishman enjoys more than the 
pleasure of sulkiness, — of not being forced to hear a 
word from any body which may occasion to him the 
necessity of replying. It is not so much that Mr. 
Bull disdains to talk, as that Mr. Bull has nothing to 
say. His forefathers have been out of spirits for six or 
seven hundred yeaTs, and, seeing nothing but fog and 
vapour, he is out of spirits too ; and when there is no 



America : but circumstances differ. American institutions are 
too new, — English institutions are ready to our hands. If we 
were to build the house afresh, we might perhaps avail our- 
selves of the improvements of a new plan ; but we have have no 
sort of wish to pull down an excellent house, strong, warm and 
comfortable, because, upon second trial, we might be able to 
alter and amend it,— a principle which would perpetuate de- 
molition and destruction. Our plan, where circumstances are 
tolerable, is \ o sit down and enjoy ourselves. 



140 



WORKS OF THE REV. SIDNEY SMITH. 



selling or buying, or no business to settle, he prefers 
being alone and looking at the fire. If any gentleman 
was in distress, he would willingly lend an helping 
hand ; but he thinks it no part of neighbourhood to 
talk to a person because he happens to be near him 
In short, with many excellent qualities, it must be ac- 
knowledged, that the English are the most disagree 
able of all the nations of Europe, — more surly and mo 
rose, with less disposition to please, to exert them- 
selves for the good of society, to make small sacrifices, 
and to put themselves out of their way. They are 
content with Magna Charta and trial by jury ; and 
think they are not bound to excel the rest of the world 
in small behaviour, if they are superior to them in 
great institutions. 

We are terribly afraid that some Americans spit up- 
on the floor, even when that floor is covered by good 
carpets. Now, all claims to civilization are suspended 
till this secretion is otherwise disposed of. No En- 
glish gentleman has spit upon the floor since the Hep- 
tarchy. 

The curiosity for which the Americans are so much 
laughed at, is not only venial, but laudable. Where 
men live in woods or forests, as is the case, of course, 
in remote American settlements, it is the duty of 
every man to gratify the inhabitants by telling them 
his name, place, age, office, virtues, crimes, children, 
lortune, and remarks ; and with fellow-travellers, it 
seems to be almost a matter of necessity to do so. 
When men ride together for 300 or 400 miles through 
the woods and prairies, it is of the greatest importance 
that they should be able to guess at subjects most 
agreeable to each other, and to multiply their common 
topics. Without knowing who your companion is, it 
is difficult to know both what to say and what to 
avoid. You may talk of honour and virtue to an attor- 
ney, or contend with a Virginian planter that men of a 
fair colour have no right to buy and sell men of a dus- 
ky colour. The following is a lively description of 
the rights of interrogation, as understood and practis- 
ed in America. 

4 As for the inquisitiveness of the Americans, I do not think 
it has been at all exaggerated.— They certainly are, they pro- 
fess to be, a very inquiring people ; and if we may sometimes 
be disposed to dispute the claims of their love of knowing to 
to the character of a liberal curiosity, we must at least admit 
that they make a most liberal use of every means in their 
power to gratify it. I have seldom, however, had any difficulty 
in repressing their home questions, if I wished it, and without 
offending them ; but I more frequently amused myself by put- 
ting them on the rack, civilly, and apparently unconsciously, 
eluded their inquiries for a time, and than awakening their 
gratitude by such a discovery of myself as I might choose to 
make. Sometimes a man would place himself at my side in 
the wilderness, and ride for a mile or two without the small- 
est communication between us, except a slight nod of the head. 
He would then, perhaps, make some grave remark on the 
weather, and if I assented, in a monosyllable, he would stick to 
my side for another mile or two, when he would commence his 
attack. " I reckon, stranger, you do not belong to these 
parts?"—" No, sir ; I am not of Alabama."— "I guess you are 
from the north ?"— No, sir ; I am not from the north."— "I 
guess you found the roads mighty muddy, and the creeks 
swimming. You are come a long way, I guess ?" — " No, not so 
very far ; we have travelled a few hundred miles since we 

turned our faces westward."—" I guess you have seen Mr. , 

or General ?" (mentioning the names of some well-known 

individuals in the middle and southern states, who were to 
serve as guide-posts to detect our route) ; but, " I have not 
the pleasure of knowing any of them," or, " I have the pleas- 
ure of knowing all," equally defeated his purpose, but not his 
hopes. " I reckon, stranger, you have had a good crop of cot- 
ton this year ?" — " I am told, sir, the crops have been unusu- 
ally abundant in Carolina and Georgia."—" You grow tobacco, 
then, I guess?" (to track me to Virginia.) "No; I do not 
grow tobacco." Here a modest inquirer would give up in de- 
spair, and trust to the chapter of accidents to develope my 
name and history ; but I generally rewarded his modesty, and 
excited his gratitude, by telling him I would torment him no 
longer. 

< The courage of a thorough-bred Yankee* would rise with 
his difficulties ; and after a decent interval, he would resume : 
" I hope no offence, sir ; but you know we Yankees lose noth- 
ing for want of asking. I guess, stranger, you are from the old 

* ' In America, the term Yankee is applied to the natives of 
New England only, and is generally used with an air of pleas- 
antry.' 



country ?"— " Well, my friend, you have guessed right at last, 
and I am sure you deserve something for your perseverance ; 
and now I suppose it will save us both trouble if I proceed to 
the second part of the story, and tell you where I am going. 
I am going to New Orleans." This is really no exaggerated 
picture : dialogues, not indeed in these very words, but to this 
effect, occurred continually; and some of them more minute 
and extended than I can venture upon in a letter. I ought, 
however, to say, that many questions lose much of their famil- 
iarity when travelling in the wilderness. " Where are you 
from?" and "whither are you bound?" do not appear imper- 
tinent interrogations at sea ; and often in the western wilds I 
found myself making inquiries which I should have thought 
very free and easy at home. -Hodgson's Letters, II. 32—35. 

In all new and distant settlements the forms of law 
must, of course, be very limited. No justice's warrant 
is current in the dismal swamp ; constables are ex- 
ceedingly puzzled in the neighbourhood of the Missis- 
sippi ; and there is no treadmill, either before or after 
trial, on the little Wabash. The consequence of this 
is, that the settlers take the law into their own hands, 
and give notice to a justice-proof delinquent to quit 
the territory ; if this notice is disobeyed, they assem- 
ble and whip the culprit, and this failing, on the se- 
cond visit, they cut off his ears. In short, Captain 
Rock has his descendants in America. Mankind can- 
not live together without some approximation to jus- 
tice ; and if the actual government will not govern 
well, or cannot govern well, is too wicked or too weak 
to do so — then men prefer Rock to anarchy. The fol- 
lowing is the best account we have seen of this system 
of irregular justice ; 

' After leaving Carlyle, I took the Shawneetown road, that 
branches off to the S. E., and passed the Walnut Hills, and 
Moore's Prairie. These two places had a year or two before 
been infested by a notorious gang of robbers and forgers, who 
had fixed themselves in these wild parts in order to avoid jus- 
tice. As the country became more settled, these desperadoes 
became more and more troublesome. The inhabitants, there- 
fore, took that method of getting rid of them that had been 
adopted not many years ago in Hopkinson and Henderson 
counties, Kentucky, and which is absolutely necessary in new 
and thinly settled districts, where it is almost impossible to 
punish a criminal according to legal forms. 

'On such occasions, therefore, all the quiet and industrious 
men of a district form themselves into companies, under the 
name of " Regulators." They appoint officers, put themselves 
under their orders, and bind themselves to assist and stand by 
each other. The first step they then take is to send notice to 
any notorious vagabonds, desiring them to quit the state in a 
certain number of days, under the penalty of receiving a 
domiciliary visit. Should the person who receives the notice 
refuse to comply, they suddenly assemble, and when unex- 
pected, go in the night time to the rogue's house, take him out, 
tie him to a tree, and give him a severe whipping every one of 
the party striking him a certain number of times. 

' This discipline is generally sufficient to drive off the cul- 
prit; but should he continue obstinate, and refuse to avail 
himself of another warning, the Regulators pay him a second 
visit, inflict a still severer whipping, with the addition probably 
of cutting off both his ears. No culprit has been known to 
remain after a second visit. For instance, an old man, the 
father of a family, all of whom he educated as robbers, fixed 
himself at Moore's Prairie, and committed numerous thefts, 
&c. &c. He was hardy enough to remain after the first visit, 
when both he and his sons received a severe whipping. At the 
second visit the Regulators punished him very severely, and 
cut off his ears. This drove him off, together with his whole 
gang ; and travellers can now pass in perfect safety where it 
was once dangerous to travel alone. 

' There is also a company of Regulators near Vincennes, 
who have broken up a notorious gang of coiners and thieves 
who had fixed themselves near that place. These rascals, 
before they were driven off, had parties settled at different 
distances in the woods, and thus held communication and 
passed horses and stolen goods from one to another, from the 
Ohio to Lake Erie, and from thence into Canada or the New 
England States. Thus it was next to impossible to detect the 
robbers, or to recover the stolen property. 

' This practice of Regulating seems very strange to an Euro- 
pean. I have talked with some of the chief men of the Regu- 
lators, who all lamented the necessity of such a system. They 
very sensibly remarked, that when the country became more 
thickly settled, there would no longer be any necessity for 
such proceedings, and that they should all be delighted at 
being able to obtain justice in a more formal manner. I forgot 
to mention, that the rascals punished, have sometimes prose- 
cuted the Regulators for an assault. The juries, however, 
knowing the bad character of the prosecutors, would give but 
trifling damages, which, divided among so many, amounted to 
next to nothing for each individual.'— -Excursion, pp. 233—836. 



AMERICA. 



141 



The same traveller mentions his having met at ta- 
ble three or four American ex-kings — presidents who 
had served their time, and had retired into private 
life ; he observes also upon the effect of a democrati- 
cal government in preventing mobs. Mobs are created 
by opposition to the wishes of the people : but when 
the wishes of the people are consulted so completely 
as they are consulted in America, all motives for the 
agency of mobs are done away. 

'It is, indeed, entirely a government of opinion. Whatever 
the people wish is done. If they want any alterations of laws, 
tariffs, &c, they inform their representatives, and if there be 
a majority that wish it, the alteration is made at once. In 
most European countries there is a portion of the population 
denominated the mob, who, not being acquainted with real 
liberty, give themselves up to occasional fits of licentiousness. 
But in the United States there is no mob, for every man feels 
himself free. At the time of Burr's conspiracy, Mr. Jefferson 
said, that there was little to be apprehended from it, as every 
man felt himself a part of the general sovereignty. The event 
proved the truth of this assertion ; and Burr, who in any other 
country would have been hanged, drawn, and quartered, is at 
present leading an obscure life in the city of New York, de- 
spised by every one.' — Excursion, p. 70. 

It is a real blessing for Am erica to be exempted from 
that vast burthen of taxes, the consequences of a long 
series of foolish, just, and necessary wars, carried on 
to please kings and queens, or the waiting maids and 
waiting lords and gentlemen, who have always go- 
verned kings and queens of the Old World. The 
Americans owe this good to the newness of their go- 
vernment ; and though there are few classical associ- 
ations, or historical recollections in the United States, 
this barrenness is well purchased by the absence of all 
the feudal nonsense, inveterate abuses, and profligate 
debts of an old country. 

1 The good effects of a free government are visible through- 
out the whole country. There are no tithes, no poor-rates, no 
excise, no heavy internal taxes, no commercial monopolies. 
An American can make candles if he have tallow, can distil 
brandy if he have grapes or peaches, and can make beer if he 
have malt and hops, without asking leave of any one, and 
much less with any fear of incurring punishment. How would 
a farmer's wife there be astonished, if told that it was contrary 
to law for her to make soap out of the potass obtained on the 
farm, and of the grease she herself had saved ! When an 
American has made these articles, he may build his little ves- 
sel, and take them without hindrance to any part of the world ; 
for there is no rich company of merchants that can say to him, 
" You shall not trade to India ; and you shall not buy a pound 
of tea of the Chinese ; as, by doing so, you would infringe upon 
our privileges." In consequence of this freedom, all the seas 
are covered with their vessels, and the people at home are 
active and independent. I never saw a beggar in any part of 
the United States ; nor was I ever asked for charity but once 
— and that was by an Irishman.' — Excursion, pp. 70, 71. 

America is so differently situated from the old go- 
vernments of Europe, that the United States afford no 
political precedents that are exactly applicable to our 
old governments. There is no idle and discontented 
population. When they have peopled themselves up to 
the Mississippi, they cross to the Missouri, and will 
go on until they are stopped by the Western Ocean ; 
and then, when there are a number of persons who 
have nothing to do, and nothing to gain, no hope for 
lawful industry and great interest in promoting chang- 
es, we may consider their situation as somewhat si- 
milar to our own, and their example as touching us 
more nearly. The changes in the constitution of 
the particular states seem to be very frequent, very 
radical, and to us very alarming ; — they seem, how- 
ever, to be thought very little of in that country, and 
to be very little heard of in Europe. Mr. Duncan, in 
the following passage, speaks of them with European 
feelings. 

■ The other great obstacle to the prosperity of the American 
nation, universal suffrage,* will not exhibit the full extent of 
its evil tendency for a long time to come ; and it is possible 
that ere that time some antidote may be discovered, to pre- 
vent or alleviate the mischief which we might naturally expect 

* In the greater number of the States, every white person, 
21 years of age, who has paid taxes for one year, is a voter ; in 
others, some additional qualifications are required, but they 
are not such as materially to limit the privilege. 



from it. It does, however, seem ominous of evil, that so little 
ceremony is at present used with the constitutions of the vari- 
ous states. The people of Connecticut, not contented with 
having prospered abundantly under their old system, have 
lately assembled a convention, composed of delegates from all 
parts of the country, in which the former order of things hat 
been condemned entirely, and a completely new constitution 
manufactured ; which, among other things, provides for the 
same process being again gone through, as soon as the prof a- 
numvulgus takes it into his head to desire it.* A sorry legacy 
the British Constitution would be to us, if it were at the mercy 
of a meeting of delegates, to be summoned whenever a majo- 
rity of the people took a fancy for a new one ; and I am afraid 
that if the Americans continue to cherish a fondness for such 
repairs, the Highlandman's pistol, with its new stock, lock, 
and barrel, will bear a close resemblance to what is ultimately 
produced.' — Duncan's Travels, II. 335, 336. 

In the Excursion there is a list of the American na- 
vy, which, in conjunction with the navy of France, 
will one day or another, we fear, settle the Catholic 
question in a way not quite agreeable to the Earl of 
Liverpool for the time being, nor very creditable to 
the wisdom of those ancestors of whom we hear, and 
from whom we suffer so much. The regulations of 
the American navy seem to be admirable. The states 
are making great exertions to increase this navy ; 
and since the capture of so many English ships, it has 
become the favourite science of the people at large. 
Their flotillas on the lakes completely defeated ours 
during the last war. 

Fanaticism of every description seems to rage and 
flourish in America, which has no establishment, in 
about the same degree which it does here under the nose 
of an established church ; they have their prophets and 
prophetesses, their preaching encampments, female 
preachers, and every variety of noise, folly, and non- 
sense, like ourselves. Among the most singular of 
these fanatics, are the Harmonites. Rapp, their foun- 
der, was a dissenter from the Lutheran church, and 
therefore, of course, the Lutheran clergy of Stutgard 
(near to which he lived) began to put Mr. Rapp in 
white sheets, to prove him guilty of theft, parricide, 
treason, and all the usual crimes of which men dis- 
senting from established churches are so often guilty ; 
and delicate hints were given respecting faggots ! 
Stutgard abounds with underwood and clergy ; and — 
away went Mr. Rapp to the United States, and, with 
a great multitude of followers, settled about twenty- 
four miles from our countryman Mr. Birkbeck. His 
people have here built a large town, and planted a 
vineyard, where they make very agreeable wine. 
They carry on also a very extensive system of hus- 
bandry, and are the masters of many flocks and herds. 
They have a distillery, brewery, tannery, make hats, 
shoes, cotton and woollen cloth, and every thing ne- 
cessary to the comfort of life. Every one belongs to 
some particular trade. But in bad weather, when there 
is danger of losing their crops, Rapp blows a horn, and 
calls them all together. Over every trade there is a 
head man, who receives the money and gives a receipt, 
signed by Rapp, to whom all the money collected is 
transmitted. When any of these workmen wants a 
hat or a coat, Rapp signs him an order for the gar- 
ment, for which he goes to the store and is fitted. 
They have one large store where these manufactures 
are deposited. This store is much resorted to by the 
neighbourhood, on account of the goodness and the 
cheapness of the articles. They have built an excel- 
lent house for their founder, Rapp— as it might have 
been predicted they would have done. The Harmo- 
nites profess equality, community of goods, and celi- 
bacy ; for the men and women (let Mr. Malthus hear 
this) live separately, and are not allowed the slightest 
intercourse. In order to keep up their numbers, they 
have once or twice sent over for a supply of Germans, 
as they admit no Americans, of any intercourse with 
whom they are very jealous. Harmonites dress and 
live plainly. It is a part of their creed that they should 
do so. Rapp, however, and the head men have no 
such particular creed for themselves ; and indulge in 
wine, beer, grocery, and other irreligious diet. Rapp 

* The people of the State of New York have subsequently 
taken a similar fancy to clout the cauldron. (1822.) 



142 



WORKS OF THE REV. SIDNEY SMITH. 



is both governor and priest ;— preaches to them in 
church, and directs all their proceedings in their 
working hours. In short, Rapp seems to have made 
use of the religious propensities of mankind, to per- 
suade one or two thousand fools to dedicate their lives 
to his service ; and if they do not get tired and fling 
their prophet into a horse-pond, they will in all proba- 
bility disperse as soon as he dies. Unitarians are in- 
creasing very fast in the United States, not being kept 
down by charges from bishops and archdeacons, their 
natural enemies. 

The author of the Excursion remarks upon the total 
absence of all games in America. No cricket, foot- 
ball, nor leap-frog — all seems solid and profitable. 

• One thing that I could not help remarking with regard to 
the Americans in general, is the total want of all those games 
and sports which obtained for our country the appellation of 
" Merry England." Although children usually transmit stories 
and sports from one generation to another, and although many 
of our nursery games and tales are supposed to have been im- 
ported into England in the vessels of Hengist and Horsa, yet 
our brethren in the United States seem entirely to have forgot- 
ten the childish amusements of our common ancestors. In 
America I never saw even the schoolboys playing at any game 
whatsoever. Cricket, foot-ball, quoits, &c, appear to be utter- 
ly unknown ; and I believe that if an American were to see 
grown-up men playing at cricket, he would express as much 
astonishment as the Italians did when some Englishmen played 
at this finest of all games in the Cascina, at Florence. Indeed, 
that joyous spirit which, in our country, animates not only 
childhood, but also maturer age, can rarely or never be seen 
among the inhabitants of the United States.' — Excursion, pp. 
502, 503. 

These are some of the leading and prominent cir- 
cumstances respecting America, mentioned in the va- 
rious works before us : of which works we can recom- 
mend the Letters of Mr. Hudson, and the Excursion 
into Canada, as sensible, agreeable books, written in 
a very fair spirit. 

America seems on the whole, to be a country pos- 
sessing vast advantages, and little inconveniences ; 
they have a cheap government and bad roads ; they 

?ay no tithes, and have stage coaches without springs, 
'hey have no poor laws and no monopolies — but their 
inns are inconvenient, and travellers are teased with 
questions. They have no collections in the fine arts ; 
but they have no lord-chancellor, and they can go to 
law without absolute ruin. They cannot make Latin 
verses, but they expend immense sums in the educa- 
tion of the poor. In all this the balance is prodigiously 
in their favour : but then comes the great disgrace 
and danger of America — the existence of slavery, 
which, if not timously corrected, will one day entail 
f and ought to entail) a bloody servile war upon the 
Americans — which will separate America into slave 
states and states disclaiming slavery, and which re- 
mains at present as the foulest blot in the moral cha- 
racter of that people. A high-spirited nation, who 
cannot endure the slightest act of foreign aggression, 
and who revolt at the very shadow of domestic tyran- 
ny — beat with cart whips, and bind with chains, and 
murder for the merest trifles, wretched human beings 
who are of a more dusky colour than themselves ; and 
have recently admitted into their Union a new state, 
with the express permission of ingrafting this atro- 
cious wickedness into their constitution ! No one can 
admire the simple wisdom and manly firmness of the 
Americans more than we do, or more despise the piti- 
ful propensity which exists among government run- 
ners to vent their small spite at their character ; but 
on the subject of slavery, the conduct of America is, 
and has been, most reprehensible. It is impossible to 
speak of it with too much indignation and contempt ; 
but for it, we should look forward with unqualified 
pleasure to such a land of freedom, and such a magni- 
ficent spectacle of human happiness. 



BENTHAM ON FALLACIES. (Edinburgh Re, 
view, 1825.) 

The Book of Fallacies : from Unfinished Papers of Jeremy 
Bentham. By a Friend. London, J. and H. L. Hunt. 1824 

There are a vast number of absurd and mischie- 
vous fallacies, which pass readily in the world for 
sense and virtue, while in truth they tend only to for- 
tify error and encourage crime. Mr. Bentham has 
enumerated the most conspicuous of these in the book 
before us. 

Whether it is necessary there should be a middle- 
man between the cultivator and possessor, learned 
economists have doubted ; but neither gods, men, nor 
booksellers can doubt the necessity of a middle-man 
between Mr. Bentham and the public. Mr. Bentham 
is long ; Mr. Bentham is occasionally involved and 
obscure ; Mr. Bentham invents new and alarming ex- 
pressions ; Mr. Bentham loves division and subdivi- 
sion — and he loves method itself more than its conse- 
quences. Those only, therefore, who know his origi- 
nality, his knowledge, his vigour, and his boldness, 
will recur to the works themselves. The great mass 
of readers will not purchase improvement at so dear 
a rate ; but will choose rather to become acquainted 
with Mr. Bentham, through the medium of reviews — 
after that eminent philosopher has been washed, 
trimmed, shaved, and forced into clean linen. One 
great use of a review, indeed, is to make men wise in 
ten pages, who have no appetite for a hundred pages ; 
to condense nourishment, to work with pulp and es- 
sence, and to guard the stomach from idle burden and 
unmeaning bulk. For half a page, sometimes for a 
whole page, Mr, Bentham writes with a power which 
few can equal ; and by selecting and omitting, an ad- 
mirable style may be formed from the text. Using 
this liberty, we shall endeavour to give an account of 
Mr. Bentham's doctrines, for the most part in his own 
words. Wherever any expression is particularly hap- 
py let it be considered to be Mr. Bentham's — the dull- 
ness we take to ourselves. 

Our Wise Ancestors — the Wisdom of our Ancestors 
— the Wisdom of Ages — venerable Antiquity — Wisdom 
of Old Times. — This mischievous and absurd fallacy 
springs from the grossest perversions of the meaning 
of words. Experience is certainly the mother of wis- 
dom, and the old have, of course, a greater experience 
than the young; but the question is, who are the old? 
and who are the young ? Of individuals living at the 
same period, the oldest has, of course the greatest ex- 
perience ; but among generations of men the reverse 
of this is true. Those who come first (our ancestors) 
are the young people, and have the least experience. 
We have added to their experience the experience of 
many centuries ; and, therefore, as far as experience 
goes, are wiser, and more capable of forming an opi- 
nion than they were. The real feeling should be, not 
can we be so presumptuous as to put our opinions in 
opposition to those of our ancestors ? but can such 
young, ignorant, inexperienced persons as our ances- 
tors necessarily were, be expected to have understood 
a subject as well as those who have seen so much 
more, lived so much longer, and enjoyed the experi- 
ence of so many centuries? All this cant, then, about 
our ancestors is merely an abuse of words, by trans- 
ferring phrases true of contemporary men to succeed- 
ing ages. Whereas (as we have before observed) of 
living men the oldest has, cazteris paribus, the most ex- 
perience ; of generations, the oldest has, cceteris pari- 
bus, the least experience. Our ancestors, up to the 
Conquest, were children in arms ; chubby boys in the 
time of Edward the First ; striplings under Elizabeth ; 
men in the reign of Queen Anne ; and we only are the 
white-bearded silver-headed ancients, who have trea- 
sured up, and are prepared to profit by, all the expe- 
rience which human life can supply. We are not dis- 
puting with our ancestors the palm of talent, in which 
they may or may not be our superiors, but the palm of 
experience, in which it is utterly impossible they can 
be our superiors. And yet, whenever the chancellor 
comes forward to protect some abuse, or to oppose 
some plan which has the increase of human happiness 
for its object, his first appeal is always to the wisdom 



BENTHAM'S BOOK OF FALLACIES. 



143 



of our ancestors j and he himself, and many noble 
lords who vote with him, are, to this hour, persuaded 
that all alterations and amendments on their devices 
are an unblushing controversy between youthful te- 
merity and mature experience [—and so, in truth, they 
are — only that much-loved magistrate mistakes the 
young for the old, and the old for the young — and is 
guilty of that very sin against experience which he at- 
tributes to the lovers of innovation. 

We cannot of course be supposed to maintain that 
our ancestors wanted wisdom, or that they were ne- 
cessarily mistaken in their institutions, because their 
means of information were more limited than ours. 
But we do confidently maintain that when we find it 
expedient to change any thing which our ancestors 
have enacted, we are the experienced persons, and 
not they. The quantity of talent is always varying in 
any great nation. To say that we are more or less 
able than our ancestors, is an assertion that requires 
to be explained. All the able men of all ages, who 
have ever lived in England, probably possessed, if 
taken altogether, more intellect than all the able men 
now in England can boast of. But if authority must 
be resorted to rather than reason, the question is, 
what was the wisdom of that single age which enact- 
ed the law, compared with the wisdom of the age 
which proposes to alter it ? What are the eminent 
mert of the one and the other period ? If you say that 
our ancestors were wiser than us, mention your date 
and year. If the splendour of names is equal, are the 
circumstances the same ? If the circumstances are 
the same, we have a superiority of experience, of 
which the difference between the two periods is the 
measure. It is necessary to insist upon this ; for upon 
sacks of wool and on benches forensic, sit grave men, 
aud agricolous persons in the Commons, crying out 
' Ancestors, Ancestors! hodie non! Saxons, Danes, 
save us I Fiddlefrig, help us .' Howel, Ethelwolf , 
protect us.' — Any cover for nonsense — any veil for 
trash — any pretext for repelling the innovations of 
conscience and of duty ! 

• So long as they keep to vague generalities — so long as the 
two objects of comparison are each of them taken in the lump 
— wise ancestors in one lump, ignorant and foolish mob of mod- 
ern times in the other — the weakness of the fallacy may es- 
cape detection. But let them assign for the period of superior 
wisdom any determinate period whatsoever, not only will the 
groundlessness of the notion be apparent (class being compar- 
ed with class in that period and the present one), but, unless 
the antecedent period be comparatively speaking a very mod- 
ern one, so wide will be the disparity, and to such an amount 
in favour of modern times, that, in comparison of the lowest 
class of the people in modern times, (always supposing them 
proficients in the art of reading, and their proficiency employ- 
ed in the reading of newspapers), the very highest and best 
informed class of these wise ancestors will turn out to be 
grossly ignorant. 

' Take, for example, any year in the reign of Henry the 
Eighth, from 1509 to 1546. At that time the House of Lords 
would probably have been in possession of by far the larger 
proportion of what little instruction the age afforded : in the 
House of Lords, among the laity, it might even then be a ques- 
tion whether, without exception, their lordships were all of 
them able so much as to read. But even supposing them all 
in the fullest possession of that useful art, political science be- 
ing the science in question, what instruction on the subject 
could they meet with at that time of day ? 

' On no one branch of legislation was any book extant from 
which, with regard to the circumstances of the then present 
times, any useful instruction could be derived : distributive 
law, penal law, international law, political economy, so far 
from existing as sciences, had scarcely obtained a name : in all 
those departments, under the head of quid faciendum, a mere 
blank : the whole literature of the age consisted of a meagre 
chronicle or two, containing short memorandums of the usual 
occurrences of war and peace, battles, sieges, executions, rev- 
els, deaths, births, processions, ceremonies, and other external 
events ; but with scarce a speech or an incident that could en- 
ter into the composition of any such work as a history of the 
human mind — with scarce an attempt at investigation into 
causes, characters, or the state of the people at large. Even 
when at last, little by little, a scrap or two of political instruc- 
tion came to be obtainable, the proportion of error and mis- 
chievous doctrine mixed up with it was so great, that whether 
a blank unfilled might not have been less prejudicial than a 
blank thus filled, may reasonably be matter of doubt. 

•If we come down to the reign of James the First, we shall 
find that Solomon of his tim« eminently eloquent as well as 



learned, not only among crowned but among uncrowned heads, 
marking out for prohibition and punishment the practices of 
devils and witches, and without any the slightest objection ok 
the part of the great characters of that day in their high situa- 
tions, consigning men to death and torment for the misfortune 
of not being so well acquainted as he was with the composition 
of the Godhead. 

• Under the name of exorcism the Catholic liturgy contains a 
form of procedure for driving out devils j — even with the help 
of this instrument, the operation cannot be performed with 
the desired success, but by an operator qualined by holy or- 
ders for the working of this as well as so many other wond- 
ers. In our days and in our country the same object is attain- 
ed, and beyond comparison more effectually, by so cheap an 
instrument as a common newspaper : before this talisman, not 
only devils but ghosts, vampires, witches, and all their kindred 
tribes, are driven out of the land, never to return again ! The 
touch of the holy water is not so intolerable to them as the 
bare smell of printers' ink. — (pp. 74 — 77.) 

Fallacy of irrevocable Laws. — A law, says Mr. Ben- 
tham, (no matter to what effect), is proposed to a le- 
gislative assembly, who are called upon to reject it, 
upon the single ground, that by those who in some 
former period exercised the same power, a regulation 
was made, having for its object to preclude for ever, 
or to the end of an unexpired period, all succeeding le- 
gislators from enacting a law to any such effect as 
that now proposed. 

Now it appears quite evident that, at every period 
of time, every legislature must be endowed with all 
those powers which the exigency of the times may re- 
quire : and any attempt to infringe on this power is 
inadmissible and absurd. The sovereign power, at 
any one period, can only form a blind guess at the 
measures which may be necessary for any future pe- 
riod : but by this principle of immutable laws, the go- 
vernment is transferred from those who are necessari- 
ly the best judges of what they want, to others who 
can know little or nothing about the matter. The 
thirteenth century decides for the fourteenth. The 
fourteenth makes laws for the fifteenth. The fifteenth 
hermetically seals up the sixteenth, which tyrannizes 
over the seventeenth, which again tells the eighteentn 
how it is to act, under circumstances which cannot be 
foreseen, and how it is to conduct itself in exigencies 
which no human wit can anticipate. 

• Men who have a century more of experience to ground 
their judgments on, surrender their intellect to men who had a 
century less experience, and who, unless that deficiency con- 
stitutes a claim, have no claim to preference. If the prior 
gentleman were, in respect of intellectual qualification, ever 
so much superior to the subsequent generation — if it under 
stood so much better than the subsequent generation itself the 
interest of that subsequent generation — could it have been in 
an equal degree anxious to promote the interest, and conse- 
quently equally attentive to those facts with which, though in 
order to form a judgment it ought to have been, it is impossi- 
ble that it should have been acquainted? In a word, will its 
love for that subsequent generation be quite so great as that 
same generation's love for itself? 

4 Not even here, after a moment's deliberate reflection, will 
the assertion be in the affirmative. And yet it is their prodi- 
gious anxiety for the welfare of their posterity that produces 
the propensity of these sages to tie up the hands of this same 
posterity for evermore— to act as guardians to its perpetual 
and incurable weakness, and take its conduct for ever out of 
its own hands. 

4 If it be right that the conduct of the 19th century should 
be determined not by its own judgment, but by that of the 
18th, it will be equally right that the conduct of the 20th cen- 
tury should be determined, not by its own judgment, but by 
that of the 19th. And if the same principle were still pursued, 
what at length would be the consequence? — that in process of 
time the practice of legislation would be at an end. The con- 
duct and fate of all men would be determined by those who 
neither knew nor cared any thing about the matter ; and the 
aggregate body of the living would remain for ever in subjec- 
tion to an inexorable tyranny, exercised as it were by the ag- 
gregate body of the dead.' — (pp. 84 — 86.) 

The despotism, as Mr. Bentham well observes, of 
Nero or Caligula, would be more tolerable than an ir- 
revocable law. The despot, through fear or favour, or 
in a lucid interval, might relent ; but how are the Par- 
liament, who made the Scotch Union, for example, 10 
be awakened from that dust in which they repose — 
the jobber and the patriot, the speaker and: the door- 
keeper, the silent voters and the men of rich allusions 



144 



WORKS OF THE REV. SIDNEY SMITH. 



— Cannings and cultivators, Barings and Beggars- 
making irrevocable laws for men who toss their re- 
mains abcut with spades, and use the relics of these 
legislators to give breadth to brocoli, and to aid the 
vernal eruption of asparagus ? 

If the law is good, it will support itself; if bad, it 
should not be supported by the irrevocable theory, 
which is never resorted to but as the veil of abuses. 
All living men must possess the supreme power over 
their own happiness at every particular period. To 
suppose that there is any thing which a whole nation 
cannot do, which they deem to be essential to their 
happiness, and thatr-they cannot do it, because anoth- 
er generation, long ago dead and gone, said it must 
not be done, is mere nonsense. While you are captain 
of the vessel, do what you please ; but the moment 
you quit the ship, I become as omnipotent as you. 
You may leave me as much advice as you please, but 
you cannot leave me commands ; though, in fact, this 
is the only meaning which can be applied to what are 
called irrevocable laws. It appeared to the legislature 
for the time being to be of immense importance to 
make such and such a law. Great good was gained, 
or great evil avoided by enacting it. Pause before 
you alter an institution which has been deemed to be 
of so much importance. This is prudence and com- 
mon sense ; the rest is the exaggeration of fools, or 
the artifice of knaves, who eat up fools. What end- 
less nonsense has been talked of our navigation laws ! 
What wealth has been sacrificed to either before they 
were repealed ! How impossible it appeared to 
Noodledom to repeal them ! They were considered of 
the irrevocable class — a kind of law over which the 
dead were only omnipotent, and the living had no 
power. Frost, it is true, cannot be put ofF by act of 
Parliament, nor can spring be accelerated by any 
majority of both houses. It is, however, quite a mis- 
take to suppose that any alterations of any of the arti- 
cles of union is as much out of the jurisdiction of Parlia- 
ment as these meteorological changes. In every year, 
and every day of that year, living men have a right to 
make their own laws, and manage their own affairs ; 
to break through the tyranny of the ante-spirants — 
the people who breathed before them, and to do what 
they please for themselves. Such supreme power 
cannot, indeed, be well exercised by the people at 
large; it must be exercised therefore by the delegates, 
or Parliament whom the people choose; and such 
Parliament, disregarding the superstitious reverence 
for irrevocable laws, can have no other criterion of 
wrong and right than that of public utility. 

When a law is considered as immutable, and the 
immutable Law happens at the same time to be too 
foolish and mischievous to be endured, instead of be- 
ing repealed, it is clandestinely evaded, or openly vi- 
olated ; and thus the authority of all law is weak- 
ened. 

Where a nation has been ancestorially bound by 
foolish and improvident treaties, ample notice must be 
given of their termination. Where the state has made 
ill-advised grants, or rash bargains with individuals, 
it is necessary to grant proper compensation. The 
most difficult case, certainly, is that of the union of 
nations, where a smaller number of the weaker nation 
is admitted into the larger senate of the greater nation, 
and will be overpowered if the question comes to a 
vote ; but the lesser nation must run this risk : it is 
not probable that any violation of articles will take 
place, till they are absolutely called for by extreme 
necessity. But let the danger be what it may, no 
danger is so great, no supposition so foolish, as to 
consider any human law as irrevocable. The shifting 
attitude of human affairs would often render such a 
condition an intolerable evil to all parties. The ab- 
surd jealousy of our countrymen at the union secured 
heritable jurisdiction to the owners ; nine and thirty 
years afterwards they were abolished, in the very 
teeth of the act of union, and to the evident promo- 
tion of the public good. 

Continuity of a Law by Oath. — The sovereign of 
England at his coronation takes an oath to maintain 
the laws of God, the true profession of the gospel, and 
the Protestant religion as established by law, and to 



preserve to the bishops and clergy of this realm the 
rights and privileges which by law appertain to them, 
and to preserve inviolate the doctrine, discipline, 
worship, and government, of the church. It has been 
suggested that by this oath the king stands precluded 
from granting those indulgences to the Irish Catholics, 
which are included in the bill for their emancipation. 
The true meaning of these provisions is of course to 
be decided, if doubtful, by the same legislative author- 
ity which enacted them. But a different notion it 
seems is now afloat. The king for the time being 
(we are putting an imaginary case) thinks as an indi- 
vidual, that he is not maintaining the doctrine, disci- 
pline, and rights of the Church of England, if he 
grants any extension of civil rights to those who are 
not members of that church, that he is violating his 
oath by so doing. This oath, then, according to this 
reasoning, is the great palladium of the church. As 
long as it remains inviolate the church is safe. How, 
then, can any monarch who has taken it ever consent 
to repeal it ? How can he, consistently with his oath 
for the preservation of the privileges of the church, 
contribute his part to throw down so strong a bulwark 
as he deems his oath to be ? The oath, then, cannot 
be altered. It must remain under all circumstances of 
society the same. The king, who has taken it, is 
bound to continue it, and to refuse his sanction to any 
Dill for its further alteration ; because it prevents 
him, and he must needs think, will prevent others from 
granting dangerous immunities to the enemies of the 
church. 

Here, then, is an irrevocable law — a piece of absurd 
tyranny exercised by the rulers of Queen Anne's time 
upon the government of 1825 — a certain art of potting 
and preserving a kingdom, in one shape, attitude, and 
flavour — and in this way it is that an institution ap- 
pears like old Ladies' Sweetmeats and made Wines — 
Apricot Jam 1822— Currant Wine 1819— Court of Chan- 
cery 1427— Penal Laws against Catholics 1676. The 
difference is, that the ancient woman is a better judge 
of mouldy commodities than the illiberal part of his 
majesty's ministers. The potting lady goes sniffing 
about and admitting light and air to prevent the pro- 
gress of decay ; while to him of the woolsack, all 
seems doubly dear in proportion as it is antiquated, 
worthless, and unusable. It ought not to be in the 
power of the sovereign to tie up his own hands, much 
less the hands of his successors. If the sovereign is 
to oppose his own opinion to that of the two other 
branches of the legislature, and himself to decide what 
he considers to be for the benefit of the Protestant 
church, and what not, a king who has spent his whole 
life in the frivolous occupation of a court, may, by 
perversion of understanding, conceive measures most 
salutary to the church to be most pernicious ; and per- 
severing obstinately in his own error, may frustrate 
the wisdom of his Parliament, and perpetuate the most 
inconceivable folly ! If Henry VIII. had argued in 
this manner, we should have had no reformation. If 
George III. had always argued in this manner, the 
Catholic code would never have been relaxed. And 
thus, a king, however incapable of forming an opinion 
upon serious subjects, has nothing to do but to pro- 
nounce the word conscience, and the whole power of 
the country is at his feet. 

Can there be greater absurdity than to say that a 
man is acting contrary to his conscience who surren- 
ders his opinion upon any subject to those who must 
understand the subject better than himself? I think 
my ward has a claim to the estate ; but the best law- 
yers tell me he has none. I think my son capable of 
undergoing the fatigues of a military life ; but the 
best physicians say he is much too weak. My Parlia- 
ment say this measure will do no harm ; but I think 
it very pernicious to the church. Am I acting contra- 
ry to my conscience because I apply much higher in- 
tellectual powers than my own to the investigation 
and protection of these high interests ? 

1 According to the form in which it is conceived, any such 
engagement is in effect either a check or a license : — a li- 
cense under the appearance of a check, and for that very 
reason but the more efficiently operative. 

< Chains to the man in power ? Yes :— but only such as 



BENTHAM'S BOOK OF FALLACIES. 



he figures with on the stage : to the spectators as imposing, 
to himself as light as possible. Modelled by the wearer to 
suit his own purposes, they serve to rattle, but not to re- 
strain. 

' Suppose a king of Great Britain and Ireland to have ex- 
pressed his fixed determination, in the event of any proposed 
law being tendered to him for his assent, to refuse such as- 
sent, and this not on the persuasion that he law would not 
be " for the utility of the subjects," but that by his corona- 
tion oath he stands precluded from so doing : — the course 
pointed out by principle and precedent, would be, a vote of 
abdication :— a vote declaring the king to have abdicated his 
royal authority, and that, as in case of death or incurable 
mental derangement, now is the time for the person next in 
succession to take his place. 

1 In the celebrated case in which a vote to this effect was 
actually passed, the declaration of abdication was in law- 
yers' language a fiction — in plain truth a falsehood — and 
that falsehood a mockery ; not a particle of his power was 
it the wish of James to abdicate, to part with ; but to in- 
crease it to a maximum was the manifest object of all his 
efforts. But in the case here supposed, with respect to a 
part, and that a principal part of the royal anthority, the 
will and purpose to abdicate aie actually declared : and this, 
beingsuch apart, without which the remainder cannot, "to 
the utility of the subjects," be exercised, the remainder 
must of necessity be, on their part and for their sake, ad- 
ded.'— (pp. 110, 111.) 

Self-trumpeter's fallacy. —Mr. Bentham explains the 
self-trumpeter's fallacy as follows : 

' There are certain men in office who, in discharge of their 
functions, arrogateto themselves a degree of probity, which 
is to exclude all imputations and all inquiry. Their asser- 
tions are to be deemed equivalent to proof; their virtues are 
guarantees for the faithful discharge of their duties ; and the 
most implicit confidence is to be reposed in them on all occa- 
sions. If you expose any abuse, propose any reform, call 
for securities, inquiry, or measures to promote publicity, they 
set up a cry of surprise, amounting almost to indignation, as 
if their integrity were questioned, or their honour wounded. 
With all this, they dexterously mix up intimations, that the 
most exalted patriotism, honour, and perhaps religion, are 
the only sources of all their actions.'— (p. 120.) 

Of course every man will try what he can effect by 
tLese means ; but (as Mr. Bentham observes) if there 
be any one maxim in politics more certain than an- 
other, it is that no possible degree of virtue in the 
governor can render it expedient for the governed to 
dispense with good la^vs and good institutions. Ma- 
dame de Stael (to her disgrace) said to the Emperor 
of Russia, ' Sire, your character is a constitution for 
your country, and your conscience its guarantee.' His 
reply was, ' Quand cela serait, je ne serais jamais 
qu'un accident heureux ;' and this we think one of the 
truest and most brilliant replies ever made by mo- 
narch. 

Laudatory Personalities. — ' The object of laudatory per- 
sonalities is to effect the rejection of a measure on account 
of the alleged good character of those who oppose it ; and 
the argument advanced is, " The measure is rendered un 
necessary by the virtue of those who are in power — their 
opposition is sufficient authority for the rejection of the 
measure. The measure proposed implies a distrust of the 
members of his majesty's government; but so great is their 
integrity, so complete their disinterestedness, so uniformly 
do they prefer the public advantage to their own, that such 
a measure is altogether unnecessary. Their disapproval is 
sufficient to warrant an opposition ; precautions can only be 
requisite where clanger is apprehended ; here, the high cha- 
racter of the individuals in question is a sufficient guarantee 
against any ground of alarm." ' — (pp. 123, 124.) 

The panegyric goes on increasing with the dignity 
of the lauded person. All are honourable and delight- 
ful men. The person who opens the door of the office 
is a person of approved fidelity; the junior clerk is a 
model of assiduity ; all the clerks are models — seven 
years' models, nine years' models and upwards. The 
first clerk is a paragon — and ministers the very per- 
fection of probity and intelligence ; and as for the 
highest magistrate of the state, no adulation is equal 
to describe the extent of his various merits ! It is too 
condescending, perhaps, to refute such folly as this. 
But we would just observe that if the propriety of the 
measure in question be established by direct argu- 
ments, these must be at least as conclusive against the 
character of those who oppose it, as their character 
can be against the measure. 



The effect of such an argument is . to give men of 
good or reputed good character, the power of putting 
a negative on any question — not agreeable tc their in- 
inclinations. 

< In every public trust, the legislator should, for the pur- 
pose of prevention, suppose the trustee disposed to break 
the trust in every imaginable way in which it would be 
possible for him to reap, from the breach of it, any personal 
advantage. This is the principle on which public institu- 
tions ought to be formed ; and when it is applied to all men. 
indiscriminately, it is injurious to none. The practical in- 
ference is, to opposeto such possible, (and what will alwaysbe 
probable) breaches of trust, every bar that can be opposed, 
consistently with the power requisite for the efficient and 
due discharge of the trust. Indeed, these arguments, drawn 
from the supposed virtues of men in power, are opposed to 
the first principles on which all laws proceed. 

' Such allegations of individual virtue are neversupported 
by specific proof, are scarce ever susceptible of specific dis- 
proof ; and specific disproof, if offered, could not be ad- 
mitted in either house of Parliament. If attempted else- 
where, the punishment would fall, not on the unworthy 
trustee, but on him by whom the unworthiness had been 
proved.'— (pp. 125, 12G.) 

Fallacies of pretended Banger. — Imputation of bad 
design — of bad character — of bad motives — of incon- 
sistency — of suspicious connections. 

The object of this class of fallacies is to draw aside 
attention from the measure to the man, and this in 
such a manner, that, for some real or supposed defect 
in the author of the measure, a corresponding defect 
shall be imputed to the measure itself. Thus ' the 
author of the measure entertains a bad design ; there- 
fore the measure is bad. His character is bad, there- 
fore the measure is bad ; his motive is bad, I will vote 
against the measure. On former occasions, this same 
person who proposed the measure was its enemy, 
therefore the measure is bad. He is on a footing of 
intimacy with this or that dangerous man, or has been 
seen in his company, or is suspected of entertaining 
some of his opinions, therefore the measure is bad. 
He bears a name that at a former period was borne by a 
set of men now no more, by whom bad principles were 
entertained — therefore the measure is bad ." 

Now, if the measure be really inexpedient, why not 
at once show it to be so ? If the measure is good, is 
it bad because a bad man is its author ? If bad, is it 
good because a good man has produced it ? What are 
these arguments, but to say to the assembly who are 
to be the judges of any measure, that their imbecility 
is too great to allow them to judge of the measure by 
its own merits, and that they must have recourse to 
distant and feebler probabilities for that purpose ? 

'In proportion to the degree of efficiency with which a man 
suffers these instruments of deception to operate upon his 
mind, he enables bad men to exercise over him a sort of power, 
the thought of which ought to cover him with shame. Allow 
this argument the effect of a conclusive one, you put into the 
power of any man to draw you at pleasure from the support 
of every measure, which in your own eyes is good, to force 
you to give your support to any and every measure which in 
your own eyes is bad. Is it good ? — the bad man embraces it, 
and, by the supposition, you reject it. Is it bad 1 — he vitupe- 
rates it, and that suffices for driving you into its embrace. 
You split upon the rocks, because he has avoided them ; you 
miss the harbour, because he has steered into it? Give 
yourself up to any such blind antipathy, you are no less in the 
power of your adversaries, than if, by a correspondently irra- 
tional sympathy and obsequiousness, you put yourself into the 
power of your friends.' — (pp. 132, 133.) 

'Besides, nothing but laborious application, and a clear and 
comprehensive intellect, can enable a man, on any giver sub- 
ject, to employ successfully relevant arguments drawn from 
the subject itself. To employ personalities, neither labour 
nor intellect is required. In this sort of contest, the most idle 
and the most ignorant are quite on a par with, if not superior 
to, the most industrious and the most highly gifted individuals. 
Nothing can be more convenient for those who would speak 
without the trouble of thinking. The same ideas are brought 
forward over and over again, and all that is required is to 
vary the turn of expression. Close and relevant arguments 
have very little hold on the passions, and serve rather to quell 
than to inflame them ; while in personalities there is always 
something stimulant, whether on the part of him who praises or 
him who blames. Praise forms a kind of oonnection between 
the party praising and the party praised, and vituperation 
gives an air of courage and independence to the party who 
bl 



140 



WORKS OF THE REV. SIDNEY SMITH. 



* Ignorance and indolence, friendship and enmity, concurring 
and conflicting interest, servility and independence, all conspire 
to give personalities the ascendency they so unhappily main- 
tain. The more we lie under the influence of our own passions, 
the more we rely on others being affected in a similar degree. 
A man who can repel these injuries with dignity, may often con- 
vert them into triumph : " Strike me, but hear," says he, and the 
fury of his antagonist redounds to his own discomfiture.' — (pp, 
141, 142.) 

No Innovation ! — To say that all new things are 
bad, is to say that all old things were bad in their 
commencement : for of all the old things ever seen or 
heard of, there is not one that was not once new. 
Whatever is now establishment was once inn ovation. 
The first innovator of pews and parish clerks was no 
doubt considered as a Jacobin in his day. Judges, 
juries, criers of the court, are all the inventions of 
ardent spirits, who filled the world with alarm, and 
were considered as the great precursors of ruin and 
dissolution. No inoculation, no turnpikes, no reading, 
no writing, no popery ! The fool sayeth in his heart, 
and crieth with his mouth, ' I will have nothing new ." 

Fallacy of Distrust. — ' What's at the Bottom? 1 — 
This fallacy begins with a virtual admission of the 
propriety of the measure considered in itself, and thus 
demonstrates its own futility, and cuts up from under 
itself the ground which it endeavours to make. A 
measure is to be rejected for something that, by bare 
possibility, may be found amiss in some other mea- 
sure ! This is vicarious reprobation ; upon this prin- 
ciple Herod instituted his massacre. It is the argu- 
ment of a driveller to other drivellers, who says, We 
are not able to decide upon the evil when it arises — 
our only safe way is to act upon the general appre- 
hension of evil. 

Official Malefactor's Screen. — ' Attack us — you at- 
tack Government.'' 

If this notion is acceded to, every one who derives 
at present any advantage from misrule has it in fee- 
simple ; and all abuses, present and future, are with- 
out remedy. So long as there is any thing amiss in 
conducting the business of government, so long as it 
can be made better, there can be no other mode of 
bringing it nearer to perfection, than the indication of 
such imperfections as at the time being exist. 

'But so far is it from being true, that a man's aversion or 
contempt for the hands by which the powers of government, 
or even for the system under which they are exercised, is a 
proof of his aversion or contempt towards the government 
itself, that, even in proportion to the strength of that aversion 
or contempt, it is a proof of the opposite affection. What, in 
consequence of that contempt or aversion, he wishes for, is not 
that there be no hands at all to excercise these powers, but 
that the hands may be better regulated ; not that those powers 
should not be exercised at all, but that they should be better 

ercised; not that in the exercise of them, no rules at all 
should be pursued, but that the rules by which they are exer- 
cised should be a better set of rules. 

'All government is a trust; every branch of government is 
a trust ; and immemorially acknowledged so to be ; it is only 
by the magnitude of the scale that public differ from private 
trusts. I complain of the conduct of a person in the character 
of guardian, as domestic guardian, having the care of a minor 
or insane person. In so doing, do I say that guardianship is a 
bad institution ? Does it enter into the head of any one to sus- 
pect me of so doing? I complain of an individual in the cha- 
racter of a commercial agent, or assignee of the effects of an 
insolvent. In so doing, do I say that commercial agency is a 
bad thing? that the practice of vesting in the hands of trustees 
or assignees the effects of an insolvent, for the purpose of their 
being divided among his creditors, is a bad practice? Does 
any such conceit ever enter into the head of man, as that of 
suspecting me ofso doing? '—(pp. 162, 163.) 

There are no complaints against government in 
Turkey — no motions in Parliament, no Morning Chro- 
nicles, and no Edinburgh Reviews: yet, of all coun- 
tries in the world, it is that in which revolts and revo- 
lutions are the most frequent. 

It is so far from true, that no good government can 
exist consistently with such disclosure, that no good 
government can exist without it. It is quite obvious, 
to aL who are capable of reflection, that by no other 
means than by lowering the governors in the estima- 
tion of the people, can there be hope or chance of 
beneficial change. To infer from this wise endeavour 
to lessen the existing rulers in the estimaiion of the 



people, a wish of dissolving the government, is either 
artifice or error. The physician who intentionally 
weakens the patient by bleeding him has no intention 
he should perish. 

The greater the quantity of respect a man receives 
independently of good conduct, the less good is his 
behaviour likely to be. It is the interest, therefore, 
of the public, in the case of each, to see that the re- 
spect paid to him should, as completely as possible, 
depend upon the goodness of his behaviour in the 
execution of his trust. But it is, on the contrary, the 
interest of the trustee, that the respect, the money, or 
any other advantage he receives hi virtue of his office, 
should be as great, as secure, and as independent of 
conduct as possible. Soldiers expect to be shot at; 
public men must expect to be attacked, and sometimes 
unjustly. It keeps up the habit of considering their 
conduct as exposed to scrutiny ; on the part of the 
people at large, it keeps alive the expectation of wit- 
nessing such attacks, and the habit of looking out for 
them. The friends and supporters of government 
have always greater facility in keeping and raising it 
up, than its adversaries have for lowering it. 

Accusation-scar er's Device. — ' Infamy must attach 
somewhere.'' 

This fallacy consists in representing the character 
of a calumniator as necessarily and justly attaching 
upon him who, having made a charge of misconduct 
against any persons possessed of political power or 
influence, fails of producing evidence sufficient for 
their conviction. 

' If taken as a general proposition, applying to all public 
accusations, nothing can be more mischievous as well as falla- 
cious. Supposing the charge unfounded, the delivery of it may 
have been accompanied with mala, fides (consciousness of its 
injustice), with temerity only, or it may have been perfectly 
blameless. It is in the first case alone that any infamy can 
with propriety attach upon him who brings it forward. A 
charge really groundless may have been honestly believed to 
be well founded, i. e., believed with a sort of provisional cre- 
dence, sufficient for the purpose of engaging a man to do his 
part towards the bringing about an investigation, but without 
sufficient reasons. But a charge may be perfectly groundless 
without attaching the smallest particle of blame upon him who 
brings it forward. Suppose him to have heard from one oi 
more, presenting himself to him in the character of percipient 
witnesses, a story which, either in toto, or perhaps only in 
circumstances, though in circumstances of the most material 
importance, should prove false and mendacious — how is the 
person who hears this, and acts accordingly, to blame ? What 
sagacity can enable a man previously to investigation, a man 
who has no power that can enable him to insure correctness or 
completeness on the part of this extrajudicial testimony, to 
guard against deception in such a case ? '—(pp. 185, 136.) 

Fallacy of false Consolation. — { What is the matter 
with you ? — What would you have ? Look at the people 
there, and there ; think how much better off you are than 
they are. Your prosperity and liberty are objects of 
their envy; your institutions models of their imita- 
tion.' 

It is not the desire to look to the bright side that is 
blamed : but when a particular suffering, produced by 
an assigned cause, has been pointed out, the object of 
many apologists is to turn the eyes of inquirers and 
judges into any other quarter in preference. If a man's 
tenants were to cp tie with a general encomium on the 
prosperity of the country, instead of a specified sum, 
would it be accepted? In a court of justice, in an ac- 
tion for damages, did ever any such device occur as 
that of pleading assets in the hands of a third person? 
There is, in fact, no country so poor and so wretched 
in every element of prosperity, in which matter for 
this argument might not be found. Were the prosper- 
ity of the country tenfold as great as at present,— the 
absurdity of the argument would not in the least de- 
gree be 'lessened. Why should the smallest evil be 
endured, which can be cured ; because others suffer 
patiently under greater evils? Should the smallest 
improvement attainable be neglected, because others 
remain contented in a state of still greater inferiority ? 

* Seriously and pointedly in the character of a bar to any 
measure of relief, no, nor to the most trivial improvement, 
can it ever be employed. Suppose a bill brought in for 
converting an impassable road any where into a passable 
one, would any man stand up to oppose it who could find 



BENTHAM'S BOOK OF FALLACIES. 



147 



nothing better to urge against it than the multitude and 
goodness of the roads we have already? No : when in the 
character of a serious bar to the measure in hand, be that 
measure what it may, an argument so palpably inapplicable 
is employed, it can only be for the purpose of creating a 
diversion ;— of turning aside the minds of men from the 
subject really in hand, to a picture which, by its beauty, it 
is hoped, may engross the attention of the assembly, and 
make them forget for the moment for what purpose they 
came there. '—(pp. 196,197.) 

The Quietist, or no Complaint. — 'A new law or measure 
being proposed in the character of a remedy for some in- 
contestable abuse or evil, an objection is frequently started 
to the following effect : — " The measure is unnecessary. 
Nobody complains of disorder in that shape, in which it is 
the aim of your measure to propose a remedy to it. But 
even when no cause of complaint has been found to exist, 
especially under governments which admit of complaints, 
men have in general not been slow to complain : much less 
where any just cause of complaint has existed." The 
argument amounts to this : — Nobody complains, therefore 
nobody suffers. It amounts to a veto on all measures of 
precaution or prevention, and goes to establish a maxim in 
legislation directly opposed to the most ordinary prudence 
of common life;— it enjoins us to build no parapets to a 
bridge till the number of accidents has raised an universal 
clamour.'— pp. 190, 191.) 

Procrastinatoi-'s Argument. — " Wait a little, this is 
not the time.^ 

This is the common argument of men, who, being 
in reality hostile to a measure, are ashamed or afraid 
of appearing to be so. To-day is the plea — eternal ex- 
clusion commonly the object. It is the same sort of 
quirk as a plea of abatement in law — which is never 
employed but on the side of a dishonest defendant, — 
whose hope it is to obtain an ultimate triumph, by 
overwhelming his adversary with despair, impoverish- 
ment, and lassitude. Which is the properest day to 
do good ? which is the properest day to remove a nui- 
sance ? we answer, the very first day a man can be 
found to propose the removal of it ; and whoever op- 
poses the removal of it on that day will (if he dare) 
oppose it on every other. There is in the minds of 
many feeble friends to virtue and improvement, an im- 
aginary period for the removal of evils, which it would 
certainly be worth while to wait for, if there was the 
smallest chance of its ever arriving — a period of unex- 
ampled peace and prosperity, when a patriotic king 
and an enlightened mob united their ardent efforts for 
the amelioration of human affairs ; when the oppressor 
is as delighted to give up the oppression, as the op- 
pressed is to be liberated from it; when the difficulty 
and the unpopularity would be to continue the evil, — 
not to abolish it ! These are the periods when fair 
weather philosophers are willing to venture out, and 
hazard a little for the general good. But the history 
of human nature is so contrary to all this, that almost 
all improvements are made after the bitterest resist- 
ance, and in the midst of tumults and civil violence — 
the worst period at which they can be made, compared 
to which any period is eligible, and should be seized 
hold of by the friends of salutary reform. 

SnaiVs Pace argument. — 'One thing at a time'. Not too 
fast! Slow and sure! — Importance of the business — ex- 
treme difficulty of the business — danger of innovation — 
need of caution and circumspection — impossibility of fore- 
seeing all consequences — danger of precipitation — every 
thing should be gradual — one thing at a time — this is not the 
time — great occupation at present — wait for more leisure — 
people well satisfied — no petitions presented— no complaints 
heard — no such mischief has yet taken place — stay till it has 
taken place ! — Such is the prattle which the magpie in office, 
who, understanding nothing, yet understands that he must 
have something to say on every subject, shouts out among 
his auditors as a succedaneum to thought.' — (pp. 203, 204.) 

Vague Generalities. — Vague generalities comprehend 
a numerous class of fallacies resorted to by those who, 
in preference to the determinate expressions which 
they might use, adopt others more vague and indeter- 
minate. 

Take, for instance, the terms, government, laws, — 
morals, religion. Every body will admit that there 
are in the world bad governments, bad laws, bad mo- 
rals, and bad religions. The bare circumstance, — 
therefore, of being engaged in exposing the defects of 
government, law, morals, and religion, does not of 



itself afford the slightest presumption that a writer is 
engaged in any thing blamable. If his attack is only 
directed against that which is bad in each, his efforts 
maybe productive of good to any extent. This essen- 
tial distinction, however, the defender of abuses uni- 
formly takes care to keep out of sight ; and boldly 
imputes to his antagonists an intention to subvert ail 
government, law, morals, and religion. Propose any 
thing with a view to the improvement of the existing 
practice, in relation to law, government, and religion, 
he will treat you with an oration upon the necessity 
and utility of law, government, and religion. Among 
the several cloudy appellatives which have been com- 
monly employed as cloaks for misgovernment, there 
is none more conspicuous in this atmosphere of illusion 
than the word order. As often as any measure is 
brought forward which has for its object to lessen the 
sacrifice made by the many to the few, social order is 
the phrase commonly opposed to its progress. 

1 By a defalcation made from any part of the mass of 
factitious delay, vexation, and expense, out of which, and 
in proportion to which, lawyers' profit is made to flow — by 
any defalcation made from the mass of needless and worse 
than useless emolument to office, with or without service or 
pretence of service — by any addition endeavoured to be 
made to the quantity, or improvement in the quality of 
service rendered, or time bestowed in service rendered in 
return for such emolument— by every endeavour that has 
for its object the persuading the people to place their fate 
at the disposal of any other agents than those in whose 
hands breach of trust is certain, due fulfilment of it morally 
and physically impossible— social order is said to be en- 
dangered, and threatened to be destroyed.,— (p. 234.) 

In the same way establishment is a word in use to 
protect the bad parts of establishments, by charging 
those who wish to remove or alter them, with a wish 
to subvert all good establishments. 

Mischievous fallacies also circulate from the con- 
vertible use of what Mr. B. is pleased to call dyslogis- 
tic and eulogistic terms. Thus a vast concern is ex- 
pressed for the liberty of the press, and the utmost ab- 
horrence for its licentiousness : but then, by the licen- 
tiousness of the press is meant every disclosure by 
which any abuse is brought to light and exposed to 
shame — by the liberty of the press is meant only pub- 
lications from which no such inconvenience is to be 
apprehended ; and the fallacy consists in employing 
the sham approbation of liberty as a mask for the real 
opposition to all free discussion. To write a pamph- 
let so ill that nobody will read it ; to animadvert in 
terms so weak and insipid upon great evils, that no 
disgust is excited at the vice, and' no apprehension in 
the evildoer, is a fair use of the liberty of the press, — 
and, is not only pardoned by the friends of govern- 
ment, but draws from them the most fervent eulogium. 
The licentiousness of the press consists in doing the 
thing boldly and well, in striking terror into the guilty, 
and in rousing the attention of the public to the de- 
fence of their highest interests. This is the licen- 
tiousness of the press held in the greatest horror by 
timid and corrupt men, and punished by semianimous 
semicadaverous judges, with a captivity of many 
years. In the same manner the dyslogistic and eulo- 
gistic fallacies are used in the case of reform. 

' Between all abuses whatsoever, there exists that connec- 
tion ^between all persons who see each of them, any one 
abuse in which an advantage results to himself, there exists, 
in point of interest, that close and sufficiently understood 
connection, of which intimation has been given already. 
To no one abuse can correction be administered without 
endangering the existence of every other. 

'If, then, with this inward determination not to suffer, 
so far as depends upon himself, the adoption of any reform 
which he is able to prevent, it should seem to him necessary 
or advisable to put on for a cover, the profession or appear- 
ance of a desire to contribute to such reform — in pursuance 
of the device or fallacy here in question, he will represent 
that which goes by the name of reform as distinguishable 
into two species; one of them a fit subject for approbation, 
the other for disapprobation. That which he tnus professes 
to have marked for approbation, he will accordingly, for 
the expression of such approbation, characterize by some 
adjunct of the eulogisttc cast, such as moderate, for example, 
or temperate, or practical, or practicable. 

< To the other of these nominally distinct species he will, 



148 



WORKS OF THE REV. SIDNEY SMITH. 



at the same time, attach some adjunct of the dyslogistic cast, 
such as violent, intemperate, extravagant, outrageous, theo- 
retical, speculative, and so forth. 

' Thus, then, in profession and to appearance, there are in 
his conception of the matter two distinct and opposite species 
<jf reform, to one of which his approbation, to the other his dis- 
approbation is attached. But the species to which his appro- 
bation is attached is an empty species— a species in which no 
individual is, or is intended to be, contained. 

; The species to which his disapprobation is attached is, on 
the contrary, a crowded species, a receptacle in which the 
whole contents of the genus— of the genus Reform are intended 
to included.— (pp. 277, 278.) 

Anti-rational Fallacies— When reason is in opposi- 
tion to a man's interests, his study will naturally be 
to render the faculty itself, and whatever issues from 
it, an object of hatred and contempt. The sarcasm 
and other figures of speech employed on the occasion 
are directed not merely against reason but against 
thought, as if there were something in the faculty of 
thought that rendered the exercise of it incompatible 
with useful and successful practice. Sometimes a 
plan, which would not suit the official person's inter- 
est, is without more ado pronounced a speculative one ; 
and, by this observation, all need of rational and de- 
liberate discussion is considered to be superseded. 
The first effort of the corruptionist is to fix the epithet 
speculative upon any scheme which he thinks may 
cherish the spirit of reform. The expression is hailed 
with the greatest delight by bad and feeble men, and 
repeated with the most unwearied energy ; and, to the 
word speculative, by way of reinforcement, are added, 
theoretical, visionary, chimerical, romantic, Utopian. 

' Sometimes a distinction is taken, and thereupon a conces- 
sion made. The plan is good in theory, but it would be had in 
■practice i. e., its being good in theory does not hinder its being 
bad in practice. 

' Sometimes, as if in consequence of a farther progress made 
in the art of irrationality, the plan is pronounced to be too 
good to he practicable ; and its being so good as it is, is thus 
represented as the very cause of its being bad in practice. 

« In short, such is the perfection at which this art is at length 
arrived, that the very circumstance of a plan's being suscepti- 
ble of the appellation of a plan, has been gravely stated as a 
circumstance sufficient to warrant its being rejected, if not 
with hatred, at any rate with a sort of accompaniment, which 
to the million is commonly felt still more galling— with con- 
tempt.'— (p.296.) 

There is a propensity to push theory too far ; but 
what is the just inference ? not that theoretical pro- 
positions (i.e., all propositions of any considerable 
comprehension or extent) should, from such their ex- 
tent, be considered to be false in toto, but only that, 
in the particular case, inquiry should be made whe- 
ther, supposing the proposition to be in the character 
of a rule generally true, an exception ought to be 
taken out of it. It might almost be imagined that 
there was something wicked or unwise in the exercise 
of thought ; for every body feels a necessity for dis- 
claiming it. ' I am not given to speculation ; I am 
no friend to theories.' Can a man disclaim theory, 
can he disclaim speculation, without disclaiming 
thought ? 

The description of persons by whom this fallacy is 
chiefly employed are those who, regarding a plan as 
adverse to their interests, and not finding it on the 
ground of general utility exposed to any predominant 
objection, have recourse to this objection in the char- 
acter of an instrument of contempt, in the view of pre- 
venting those from looking into it who might have 
been otherwise disposed. It is by the fear of seeing 
it practised that they are drawn to speak of it as im- 
practicable. ' Upon the face of it (exclaims some fee- 
ble or pensioned gentleman), it carries that air of 
plausibility, that if you were not upon your guard, 
might engage you to bestow more or less of attention 
upon it ; but were you to take the trouble, you would 
find that (as it is with all these plans which promise 
so much) , practicability would at last be wanting to 
it. To save yourself' from this trouble, the wisest 
course you ean take is to put the plan aside, and to 
think no more about the matter.' This is always ac- 
companied with a peculiar grin of triumph. 

The whole of these fallacies may be gathered toge- 
ther in a little oration, which we will denominate the 



Noodle's Oration. 
' What would our ancesters say to this, sir? How 
does this measure tally with their institutions ? How 
does it agree with their experience ? Are we to put 
the wisdom of yesterday in competition with the wis- 
dom of centuries? (Hear, hear !) Is beardless youth 
to show no respect for the decisions of mature age ? — 
(Loud cries of hear! hear!) If this measure is right, 
would it have escaped the wisdom of those Saxon pro- 
genitors to whom we are indebted for so many of our 
best political institutions ? Would the Danes have 
passed it over ? Would the Norman have rejected it ? 
Would such a notable discovery have been reserved 
for these modern and degenerate times ? Besides, 
sir, if the measure itself is good, I ask the honourable 
gentlemen if this is the time for carrying it into exe- 
cution — whether, in fact, a more unfortunate period 
could have been selected than that which he has cho- 
sen ? If this were an ordinary measure, I should not 
oppose it with so much vehemence ; but, sir, it calls in 
question the wisdom of an irrevocable law — a law 
passed at the memorable period of the Revolution. — 
What right have we, sir, to break down this firm col- 
umn, on which the great men of that day stampt a 
character of eternity ? Are not all authorities against 
this measure, Pitt, Fox, Cicero, and the Attorney aud 
Solicitor General ? The proposition is new, sir ; it is 
the first time it was ever heard in this house. I am 
not prepared, sir — this house is not prepared, to re- 
ceive it. The measure implies a distrust of his maj- 
esty's government ; their disapproval is sufficient to 
warrant opposition. Precaution only is requsite where 
danger is apprehended. Here the high character of the 
individual in question is a sufficient guarantee against 
any ground of alarm. Give not, then, your sanction 
to this measure ; for, whatever be its character, if you 
do give your sanction to it, the same man by whom 
this is proposed, will propose to you others to which it 
will be impossible to give your consent. I care very 
little, sir, for the ostensible measure ; but Avhat is 
there behind ? What are the honourable gentleman's 
future schemes ? If we pass this bill, what fresh con- 
cessions may he not require ? What farther degrada- 
tion is he planning for his country ? Talk of evil and 
inconvenience, sir ! look to other countries — study 
other aggregations and societies of men, and then see 
whether the laws of this country demand a remedy, 
or deserve a panegyric. Was the honourable gentle- 
man (let me ask him) always of this way of think- 
ing ? Do I not remember when he was the advocate 
in this house of very opposite opinions ? I not only 
quarrel with his present sentiments, sir, but I declare 
very frankly I do not like the party with which he 
acts. If his own motives were as pure as possible, 
they cannot but suffer contamination from those with 
whom he is politically associated. This measure may 
be a boon to the constitution, but I will accept no fa- 
vour to the constitution from such hands. (Lozid cries 
of hear ! hear !) I profess myself, sir, an honest and 
upright member of the British Parliament, and I am 
not afraid to profess myself an enemy to all change, 
and all innovation. I am satisfied with things as they 
are ; and it will be my pride and pleasure to hand down 
this country to my children as I received it from those 
who preceded me. The honourable gentleman pre- 
tends to justify the severity with which he has at- 
tacked the noble lord who presides in the Court of 
Chancery. But I say such attacks are pregnant with 
mischief to government itself. Oppose ministers, you 
oppose government : disgrace ministers, you disgrace 
government : bring ministers into contempt, you bring 
government into contempt ; and anarchy and civil war 
are the consequences. Besides, sir. the measure is 
unnecessary. Nobody complains of disorder in that 
shape in which it is the aim of your measure to pro- 
pose a remedy to it. The business is one of the great- 
est importance ; there is need of the greatest caution 
and circumspection. Do not let us be precipitate, sir ; 
it is impossible to foresee all consequences. Every 
thing should be gradual ; the example of a neighbour- 
ing nation should fill us with alarm ! The honourable 
gentleman has taxed me with illiberality, sir. I deny 
the charge. I hate innovation, but I love improve- 



WANDERINGS IN SOUTH AMERICA. 



149 



ment. I am an enemy to the corruption of govern- 
ment, but I defend its influence. I dread reform, but 
I dread it only when it is intemperate. I consider the 
liberty of the press as the great palladium of the con- 
stitution , but, at the same time, I hold the licentious- 
ness of the press in the greatest abhorrence. Nobody 
is more conscious than I am of the splendid abilities 
of the honourable mover, but I tell him at once, his 
scheme is too good to be practicable. It savours of 
Utopia. It looks well in theory, but it won't do in 
practice. It will not do, I repeat, sir, in practice ; and 
so the advocates of the measure will find, if. unfortu- 
nately, it should find its way through Parliament. — 
(Cheers.) The source of that corruption to which the 
honourable member alludes, is in the minds of the 
people ; so rank and extensive is that corruption, that 
no political reform can have any effect in removing it. 
Instead of reforming others — instead of reforming the 
state, the constitution, and every thing that is most 
excellent, let each man reform himself ! let him look 
at home, he will find there enough to do, without look- 
ing abroad, and aiming at what is out of his power. — 
(Loud Cheers.) And now, sir, as it is frequently the 
custom in this house to end with a quotation, and as 
the gentleman who preceded me in the debate, has an- 
ticipated me in my favorite quotation of the " Strong 
pull and the long pull," I shall end with the memora- 
ble words of the assembled Barons. — Nolumus leges 
Anglice mutarL' 

4 Upon the whole, the following are the characters which 
appertain in common to all the several arguments here distin- 
guished by the name of fallacies : — 

' 1. Whatsoever be the measure in hand, they are, with rela- 
tion to it, irrelevant. 

4 2. They are all of them such, that the application of these 
irrelevant arguments affords a presumption either of the weak- 
ness or total absence of relevant arguments on the side on 
which they are employed. 

1 3. To any good purpose they are all of them unnecessary. 

4 4. They are all of them not only capable of being applied, 
but actually in the habit of being applied, and with advantage, 
to bad purposes, viz., to the obstruction and defect of all such 
measures as have for their object the removal of the abuses o' 
other imperfections still discernible in the frame and practice 
of the government. 

4 5. By means of their irrelevancy, they all of them consume 
and misapply time, thereby obstructing the course and retard- 
ing the progress of all necessary and useful business. 

'6. By that irritative quality which, in virtue of their irrele- 
vancy, with the improbity or weakness of which it is indica- 
tive, they possess, all of them, in a degree more or less consi- 
derable, but in a more particular degree such of them as con- 
sist in personalities, they are productive of ill-humour, which 
in some instances has been productive of bloodshed, and is 
continually productive, as above, of waste of time and hin- 
drance of business. 

4 7. On the part of those who, whether in spoken or written 
discourses, give utterance to them, they are indicative either of 
improbity or intellectual weakness, or of a contempt for the 
understandings of those on whose minds they are destined to 
operate. 

4 8. On the part of those on whom they operate, they are 
indicative of intellectual weakness; and on the part of those 
in and by whom they are pretended to operate, they are indi- 
cative of improbity, viz., in the shape of insincerity. 

4 The practical conclusion is, that in proportion as the 
acceptance, and thence the utterance, of them can be prevent- 
ed, the understanding of the public will be strengthened, the 
morals of the public will be purified, and the practice of go- 
vernment improved.' — (pp. 359, 960.) 



WATERTON. (Edinburgh Review, 1826.) 

Wanderings in South America, the North- West of the United 
States, and the Antilles, in the years 1812, 1816, 1820, and 
1824 ; with Original Instructions for the Preservation of 
Birds, &fC, for Cabinets of Natural History. By Charles 
Waterton, Esq. London, Mawman. 4to. 1825. 

Mr. Waterton is a Roman Catholic gentleman of 
"Yorkshire, of good fortune, who, instead of passing 
his life at balls and assemblies, has preferred living 
with Indians and monkeys in the forests of Guiana. 
He appears in early life to have been seized with an 
unconquerable aversion to Piccadilly, and to that train 
of meteorological questions and answers, whim forms 
the great staple of nolite English conversation From 



a dislike to the regular form of a journal, he /hrows 
his travels into detached pieces, which he, rather af- 
fectedly, calls Wanderings — and of which we shall 
proceed to give some account. 

His first Wandering was in the year 1812, through 
the wilds of Demerara and Essequibo, a part of ci-de- 
vant Dutch Guiana, in South America. The sun ex- 
hausted him by day, the musquitoes bit him by night ; 
but on went Mr. Charles Waterton ! 

The first thing which strikes us in this extraordina- 
ry chronicle, is the genuine zeal and inexhaustible de- 
light with which all the barbarous countries he visits 
are described. He seems to love the forests, the ti- 
gers, and the apes ; — to be rejoiced that he is the only 
man there ; that he has left his species far away ; 
and is at last in the midst of his blessed baboons ! 
He writes with a considerable degree of force and 
vigour ; and contrives to infuse into his reader that 
admiration of the great works, and undisturbed scenes 
of nature, which animates his style, and has influenc- 
ed his life and practice. There is something, too, to be 
highly respected and praised in the conduct of a coun- 
try gentleman, who, instead of exhausting life in the 
chase, has dedicated a considerable portion of it to the 
pursuit of knowledge. There are so many tempta- 
tions to complete idleness in the life of a country gen- 
tleman, so many examples of it, and so much loss to 
the community from it, that every exception from the 
practice is deserving of great praise. Some country 
gentlemen must remain to do the business of their 
counties ; but, in general, there are many more than 
are wanted ; and, generally speaking also, they are a 
class who should be stimulated to greater exertions. 
Sir Joseph Banks, a squire of large fortune in Lincoln- 
shire, might have given up his existence to double- 
barrelled guns and persecutions of poachers — and all 
the benefits derived from his wealth, industry, and 
personal exertion in the cause of science, would have 
been lost to the community. 

Mr. Waterton complains, that the trees of Guiana 
are not more than six yards in circumference^ — a mag- 
nitude in trees which is not easy for a Scotch imagi- 
nation to reach. Among these, pre-eminent in height 
rises the mora — upon whose top branches, when na- 
ked by age, or dried by accident, is perched the tou- 
can, too high for the gun of the fowler ; — around this 
are the green heart, famous for hardness ; the tough 
hackea : the ducalabali, surpassing mahogony ; the 
ebony and letter-wood, exceeding the most beautiful 
woods of the Old World; the locust-tree, yielding co- 
pal ; and the hayawa and olou trees, furnishing sweet- 
smelling resin. Upon the top of the mora grows the 
fig-tree.' The bush-rope joins tree and tree, so as to 
render the forest impervious, as, descending from on 
high, it takes root as soon as its extremity touches 
the ground, and appears like shrouds and stays sup- 
porting the mainmast of a line-of-battle-ship. 

Demerara yields to no country in the world in her 
birds. The mud is flaming with the scarlet curlew. 
At sunset, the pelicans return from the sea to the cou- 
rada trees. Among the floAvers are the humming- 
birds. The columbine, gallinaceous, and passerine 
tribes people the fruit-trees. At the close of day, the 
vampires, or winged bats, suck the blood of the trav- 
eller, and cool him by the flap of their wings. Nor 
has nature forgotten to amuse herself here in the com- 
position of snakes : — the camoudi has been killed from 
thirty to forty feet long ; he does not act by venom, 
but by size and convolution. The Spaniards affirm 
that he grows to the length of eighty feet, and that he 
will swallow a bull ; but Spaniards love the superla- 
tive. There is a whipsnake of a beautiful green. The 
labarri snake of a dirty brown, who kills you in a few 
minutes. Every lovely colour under heaven is lavish- 
ed upon the counachouchi, the most venomous of rep- 
tiles, and known by the name of the bush-master. 
Man and beast, says Mr. Waterton, fly before him, and 
allow him to pursue an undisputed path. 

We consider the following description of the vari- 
ous sounds in these wild regions as very striking, and 
done with very considerable powers of style. 

4 He whose eye can distinguish the various beauties of un- 
cultivated nature, and whose ear is not shut to the wild sound* 



150 



WORKS OF THE REV. SIDNEY SMITH. 



in the woods, will be delighted in passing up the river Denie- 
rara. Every now and then, the maain or tinaniou sends forth 
one long and plaintive whistle from the depths of the forest, 
and then stops; whilst the yelping of the toucan, and the 
shrill voice of the bird called pi-pi-yo, is heard during the 
interval. The catnpanero never fails to attract the attention 
of the passenger: at a distance of nearly three miles you may 
hear this snow-white bird tolling every four or five minutes, 
like the distant convent bell. From six to nine in the morn- 
ing, the forests resound with the mingled cries and strains of 
the leathered race ; after this they gradually die away. From 
eleven to three all nature is hushed as in a midnight silence, 
and scarce a note is heard saving that of the campanero and 
tiie pi-pi-yo; it is then that, oppressed by the solar heat, the 
birds retire to the thickest shade, and wait for the refreshing 
cool of evening. 

' At sundown, the vampires, bats, and goatsuckers dart from 
their lonely retreat, and skim along the trees on the river's 
bank. The different kinds of frogs almost stun the ear with 
their hoarse and hollow-sounding croaking, while the owls 
and goatsuckers lament and mourn all night long. 

'About two hours before daybreak you will hear the red 
monkey moaning as though in deep distress ; the houtou, a 
solitary bird, and only found in the thickest recesses of the 
forest, distinctly articulates "houtou, houtou," in alow and 
plaintive tone, an hour before sunrise ; the maam whistles 
about the same hour; the haniiaquoi, pataca, and maroudi 
announce his near approach to the eastern horizon, and the 
parrots and paroquets confirm his arrival there.' — (pp. 13 — 15.) 

Our good Quixote of Dcmerara is a little too fond of 
apostrophizing : — ' Traveller ! dost thou think { 
Reader ! dost thou imagiue !' Mr. Waterton shotdd 
remember, that the whole merit of these violent devi- 
ations from common style depends upon their rarity, 
and that nothing does, for ten pages together, but the 
indicative mood. This fault gives an air of affecta- 
tion to the writing of Mr. Waterton, which we believe 
to be foreign from his character and nature. We do 
not wish to deprive him of these indulgences altogeth- 
er ; but merely to put him upon an allowance, and 
upon such an allowance as will give to these figures of 
speech the advantage of surprise and relief. 

This gentleman's delight and exultation always ap- 
pear to increase as he loses sight of European inven- 
tions, and comes to something purely Indian, Speak- 
ing of an Indian tribe, he says, — 

< They had only one gun, and it appeared rusty and ne- 
glected ; but their poisoned weapons were in fine order. 
Their blow-pipes hung from the roof of the hut, carefully 
suspended by a silk grass cord ; and on taking a nearer view 
of them, no dust seemed to have collected there, nor had 
the spider spun the smallest web on them ; which showed 
that they were in constant use. The quivers were close by 
them, with the jaw-bone of the fish pirai tied by a string to 
their brim, and a small wicker-basket of wild cotton, which 
hung down to the centre: they were nearly full of poisoned 
arrows. It was with difficulty these Indians could be per- 
suaded to part with any of the Wourali poison, though a 
good price was ottered for it: they gave; us to understand 
that it was powder and shot to them, and very difficult to be 
procured.' — (pp. 34, 35.) 

A wicker-basket of wild cotton, full of poisoned ar- 
rows, for shooting fish ! This is Indian with a ven- 
geance. We fairly admit that, in the contemplation 
of such utensils, every trait of civilized life is com- 
pletely and effectually banished. 

One of the strange and fanciful objects of Mr. Wa- 
tevton's journey was, to obtain a better knowledge of 
the composition and nature of the Wourali poison, the 
ingredient with which the Indians poison their arrows. 
In the wilds of Essequibo, far away from any Euro- 
pean settlements, there is a tribe of Indians known by 
the name of Maeoushi. The Wourali poison is used 
by all the South American savages, betwixt the Am- 
azon and the Oroonoquc ; but the Maeoushi Indians 
manufacture it with the greatest skill, and of the 
greatest strength. A vine grows in the forest called 
Wourali; and from this vine, together with a good 
deal of nonsense and absurdity, the poison is prepar- 
ed. When a native of Macoushia goes in quest of 
leathered game, he seldom carries his bow and ar- 
rows. It is the blow-pipe he then uses. The reed 
grows to an amazing length, as the part the Indians 
use is from 10 to 11 feel long, and no tapering can be 
perceived, one end being as thick as another ; nor is 
there the slightest appearance of a knot or joint. The 
end which is applied to the mouth is tied rouud with 



a small silk grass cord. The arrow is from nine to ten 
inches long ; it is made out of the leaf of a palm-tree, 
and pointed as sharp as a needle : about an inch of the 
pointed end is poisoned : the other end is burnt to 
make it still harder ; and wild cotton is put around it 
for an inch and a half. The quiver holds from 500 to 
600 arrows, is from 12 to 14 inches long, and ill shape 
like a dice-box. With a quiver of these poisoued ar- 
rows over his shoulder, and his blow-pipe in his hand, 
the Indian stalks into the forest in quest of his feath- 
ered game, 

< These generally sit high up in the tall and tufted trees, 
but still are not out of the Indian's reach ; for his blow-pipe, 
at its greatest elevation, will send an arrow three hundred 
feet. Silent as midnight he steals under them, and so cau- 
tiously does he tread the ground, that the fallen leaves rus- 
tle not beneath his feet. His ears are open to the least 
sound, while his eye, keen as that of the lynx, is employed 
in finding out the game in the thickest shade. Often he 
imitates their cry, and decoys them from tree to tree, till 
they are within range of his tube. Then taking a poisoned 
arrow from his quiver, he puts it in the blow-pipe, and col- 
lects his breath for the fatal puff. 

'About two feet from the end through which he blows, 
there are fastened two teeth of the acouri, and these serve 
him for a sight. Silent and swift the arrow flies, and sel 
dom failsto pierce the object at which it is sent. Sometimes 
the wounded bird remains in the same tree where it was 
shot, but in three minutes falls down at the Indian's feet. 
Should he take wing, his flight is of short duration, and the 
Indian, following in the direction he has gone, is sure to find 
him dead. 

' It is natural to imagine that, when a slight wound only 
is inflicted, the game will make its escape. Far otherwise ; 
the Wourali poison instantaneously mixes with blood or 
water, so that if you wet your finger, and dash it along the 
poisoned arrow in the quickest manner possible, you are 
sure to carry off some of the poison. 

' Though three minutes generally elapse before the con- 
vulsions come on in the wounded bird, still a stupor evi- 
dently takes place sooner, and this stupor manifests itself by 
an apparent unwillingness in the bird to move. This was 
very visible in a dying fowl.' — (pp. CO— 62.) 

The flesh of the game is not in the slightest degree 
injured by the poison ; nor does it appear to be cor- 
rupted sooner than that killed by the gun or knife. 
For the larger animals, an arrow with a poisoned spike 
is used. 

' Thus armed with deadly poison, and hungry as the hy- 
rena, he ranges through the forest inquest of the wild beasts' 
trad;. No hound can act a surer part. Without clothes to 
fetter him, or shoes to bind his feet, he observes the foot 
stops of the game, where an European eye could not dis- 
cern the smallest vestige. He pursues it through all its 
turns and windings, with astonishing perseverance, and suc- 
cess generally crowns his efforts. The animal, after receiv- 
ing the poisoned arrow, seldom retreats two hundred paces 
before it drops. 

1 In passing over land from Essequibo to the Demarara, we 
fell in with a drove of wild hogs. Though encumbered with 
baggage, and fatigued with a hard day's walk, an Indian got 
his bow ready, and let lly a poisoned arrow at one of them. 
It entered the cheek-bone, and broke right off. The wild hog 
was found quite dead about one hundred and seventy paces 
from the place where he had been shot. He afforded us an 
excellent and wholesome supper.' — (p. 65.) 

Being a Wourali poison fancier, Mr. Waterton has 
recorded several instances of the power of his favour- 
ite drug. A sloth poisoned by it went gently to sleep, 
and died ! a large ox, weighing one thousand pounds, 
was shot with three arrows ; the poison took effect in 
four minutes, and in twenty-live minutes he was dead. 
The death seems to be very gentle ; and resembles 
more a quiet apoplexy, brought on by hearing a long 
story, than any other kind of death. If an Indian 
happens to be wounded with one of these arrows, he 
considers it as certain death. We have reason to con- 
gratulate ourselves, that our method of terminating 
disputes is by sword and pistol, and not by these 
medicated phis; which, we presume, will become the 
weapons of gentlemen in the new republics of South 
America. 

The second journey of Mr. Waterton, in the year 
1816, was to Pernainbuco, in the southern hemisphere, 
on the coast of Brazil, and from thence he proceeds to 
Cayenne. His plan was, to have ascended the Ama- 
zon from Para, and get into the Rio Negro, and from 



WANDERINGS IN SOUTH AMERICA. 



151 



thence to have returned towards the source of the 
Essequibo, in order to examine the Crystal Mountains, 
and to look once more for Lake Parima, or the White 
Sea ; but on arriving at Cayenne, he found that to 
beat up the Amazon would be long and tedious ; he 
left Cayenne, therefore, in an American ship for Para- 
maribo, went through the interior to Coryntin, stopped 
a few days at New Amsterdam, and proceeded to 
Demerara. 

'Leave behind you' (he says to the traveller) your high-sea- 
soned dishes, your wines and your delicacies; carry nothing 
but what is necessary for your own comfort, and the object in 
view, and depend upon the skill of an Indian, or your own, for 
fish or game. A sheet about twelve feet long, ten wide, painted, 
and with loop-holes on each side, will be of great service: in a 
few minutes you can suspend it betwixt two trees in the shape 
of a roof. Under this, in your hammock, you may defy the 
pelting shower, and sleep heedless of the dews of night. A hat, 
a shirt, and a light pair oftrowscrs, will be all the raiment you 
require. Custom will soon teach you to tread lightly and bare- 
foot on the little inequalities of the ground, and show you how 
to pass on, unwounded, amid the mantling briars.' — (pp. 112, 
113.) 

Snakes are certainly an annoyance ; but the snake, 
though high-spirited, is not quarrelsome ; he considers 
his fangs to be given for defence, and not for annoy- 
ance, and never inflicts a wound but to defend exis- 
tence. If you tread upon him, he puts you to death 
for your clumsiness, merely because he does not un- 
derstand what your clumsiness means ; and certainly 
a snake, who feels fourteen or fifteen stone stamping 
upon his tail, has little time for reflection, and may 
be allowed to be poisonous and peevish. American 
tigers generally run away — from which several respec- 
table gentlemen in Parliament inferred, in the Ameri- 
can war, that American soldiers would run away 
also ! 

The description of the birds is very animated and 
interesting ; but how far does the gentle reader im- 
agine the campanero may be heard, whose size is that 
of a jay ? Perhaps 300 yards. Poor innocent, igno- 
rant rer.der .' unconscious of what nature has done in 
the forests of Cayenne, and measuring the force of 
tropical intonation by the sounds of a Scotch duck ! 
The campanero may be heard three miles ! — this 
single little bird being more powerful than the belfry 
of a cathedral, ringing for a new dean — just appointed 
on account of shabby politics, small understanding, and 
good family ! 

'The fifth species is the celebrated campanero of the Span- 
iards, called dara by the Indians, and bell-bird by the English. 
He is about the size of the jnj\ His plumage is white as snow. 
On his forehead rises a spiral tube about three inches long. It 
is jet black, dotted all over with small white feathers. It has 
a communication with the palate, and when filled with air, 
looks like a spire; when empty, it becomes pendulous. His 
note is loud and clear, like the sound of a bell, and may be 
heard at the distance of three miles. In the midst of these 
extensive wilds, generally on the dried top of an aged mora, 
almost out of gun reach, you will see the campanero. No sound 
or song from any of the winged inhabitants of the forest, not 
even the clearly pronounced ' Whip-poor-Will," from the 
goatsucker, causes such astonishment as the toll of the cam- 
panero. 

'With many of the feathered race he pays the common 
tribute of a morning and an evening song; and even when the 
meridian sun has shut in silence the mouths of almost the whole 
of animated nature, the campanero still cheers the forest. 
Von hear his toll, and then a pause for a minute, then another 
toll, and then a pause, again, and then a toll, and again a toll, 
ind again a pause.' — (pp. 117, 118,) 

It is impossible to contradict a gentleman who has 
been in the forests of Cayenne; but we are determined, 
as soon as a campanero is brought to England, to make 
him toll in a public place, and have the distance mea- 
sured. The toucan has an enormous bill, makes a 
noise like a puppy dog, and lays his eggs in hollow 
trees. How astonishing are the freaks and fancies of 
nature ! To what purpose, we say, is a bird placed in 
the woods of Cayenne, with a bill a yard long, making 
a noise like a puppy dog, and laying eggs in hollow 
trees ? The toucans, to be sure, might retort, to what 
purpose were gentlemen in Bond street created ? To 
what purpose were certain foolish prating members of 
Parliament created? — pestering the House of Com- 



mons with their ignorance and folly, and impeding the 
business of the country ? There is no end of such 
questions. So we will not enter into the metaphysics 
of the toucan. The houtou ranks high in beauty ; his 
whole body is green, his wings and tail blue ; his 
crown is of black and blue ; he makes no nest, but 
rears his young in the sand. 

' The cassique, in size, is larger than the starling; he courts 
the society of man, but disdains to live by his labours. When 
nature calls for support, he repairs to the neighbouring forest, 
and there partakes of the store of fruits and seeds, which she 
has produced in abundance for her aerial tribes. When his 
repast is over, he returns to man, pays the little tribute which 
he owes him for his protection ; he takes his station on a tree 
close to his house ; and there, for hours together, pours forth 
a succession of imitative notes. His own song is sweet, but 
very short. If a toucan be yelping in the neighbourhood, he 
drops it, and imitates him. Then he will amuse his protector 
with the cries of the different species of woodpecker; and 
when the sheep bleat, he will distinctly answer them. Then 
comes his own song again, or if a puppy dog or a guinea fowl 
interrupt him, he takes them off admirably, and by his different 
gestures during the time, you would conclude that he enjoys 
the sport. 

'The cassique is gregarious, and imitates any sound he 
hears witli such exactness, that he goes by no other name than 
that of mocking-bird amongst the colonists.' — (pp. 127, 128.) 

There is no end to the extraordinary noises of the 
forest of Cayenne. The woodpecker, in striking 
against the tree with his bill, makes a sound so loud, 
that Mr. Waterton says it reminds you more of a 
wood-cutter than a bird. While lying in your ham- 
mock, you hear the goatsucker lamenting like one in 
deep distress — a stranger would take it for a Weir 
murdered by Thurtell. 

•Suppose yourself in hopeless sorrow, begin with aloud 
note, and pronounce " ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha,'" each note 
lower, till the last is scarcely heard, pausing a moment or two 
betwixt every note, and you will have some idea of the moan- 
ing of the largest goatsucker in Demerara.' — (p. 141.) 

One species of the goatsucker cries, l Who are ym 1 
who are you?' Another exclaims, Work away, work 
away.' A third, ' Willy come go, Willy come go.' 
A fourth, ' Whip poor Will, whip poor Will.' It is 
very flattering to us that they should all speak Eng- 
lish ! — though we cannot much commend the elegance 
of their selections. The Indians never destroy these 
birds, believing them to be the servants of Jumbo, the 
African devil. 

Great travellers are very fond of triumphing over 
civilized life ; and Mr. Waterton does not omit the 
opportunity of remarking, that nobody ever stopt him 
in the forests of Cayenne to ask him for his license, or 
to inquire if he had an hundred a year, or to take away 
his gun, or to dispute the limits of a manor, or to 
threaten him with a tropical justice of the peace. We 
hope, however, that in this point we are on the eve of 
improvement. Mr. Peel, who is a man of high char- 
acter and principles, may depend upon it that the 
time is come for his interference, and that it will be a 
loss of reputation to him not to interfere. If any one 
else can and will carry an alteration through Parlia- 
ment, there is no occasion that the hand of govern- 
ment should appear ; but some hand must appear. 
The common people are becoming ferocious, and the 
perdricide criminals are more numerous than the vio- 
lators of all the branches of the Decalogue. 

'The king of the vultures is very handsome, and seems to be 
the only bird which claims regal honours from the surround- 
ing tribe. It is a fact beyond all dispute, that when the scent 
of carrion has drawn together hundreds of the common vul- 
tures, they all retire from the carcass as soon as the king of the 
vultures makes his appearance. When his majesty has satis- 
fied the cravings ol his royal stomach with the choicest bits 
from the most stinking and corrupted parts, he generally retires 
to a neighbouring tree, and then the common vultures return in 
crowds to gobble down his leavings. The Indians, as well as 
the whites, have observed this ; for when one of them, who has. 
learned a little English, sees the king, and wishes you to have <i 
proper notion of the bird, he says," There is the governor of 
the carrion crows." 

' Now, the Indians have never heard of a personage in Deme- 
rara higher than that of governor ; and the colonists, through 
a common mistake, call the vultures carrion crows. Hence tho 
Indian, in order to express the dominion of this bird over the 



162 



WORKS OF THE REV. SIDNEY SMITH. 



common vultures, tells you he is the governor of the carrion 
crows. The Spaniards have also observed it, for, through all 
the Spanish Main, he is called Rey de Zamuros, kiug of the 
vultures.' — (p. 146.) 

This, we think, explains satisfactorily the origin of 
kingly government. As men have f learnt from the 
dog the physic of the field,' they may probably have 
learnt from the vulture those high lessons of policy 
upon which, in Europe, we suppose the whole happi- 
ness of society, and the very existence of the human 
race, to depend. 

Just before his third journey, Mr. Waterton takes 
leave of Sir Joseph Banks, and speaks of him with 
affectionate regret. ' I saw,' (says Mr. W.) ' with 
sorrow, that death was going to rob us of him. We 
talked of stuffing quadrupeds ; I agreed that the lips 
and nose ought to be cut off, and stuffed with wax.' 
This is the way great naturalists take an eternal fare- 
well of each other ! Upon stuffing animals, however, 
Ave have a word to say. Mr. Waterton has placed at 
the head of his book the picture of what he is pleased 
to consider a nondescript species of monkey. In this 
exhibition our author is surely abusing his stuffing 
talents, and laughing at the public. It is clearly the 
head of a master in chancery — whom we have often 
seen backing in the House of Commons after he has 
delivered his message. It is foolish thus to trifle with 
science and natural history. Mr. Waterton gives an 
interesting account of the sloth, an animal of which 
he appears to be fond, and whose habits he has studied 
with peculiar attention. 

'Some years ago I kept a sloth in my room for several 
mouths. I often took him out of the house and placed him 
upon the ground, in order to have an opportunity of observing 
his motions. If the ground were rough, he would pull himself 
forwards, by means of his fore legs, at a pretty good pace ; and 
he invariably shaped his course towards the nearest tree. But 
if I put him upon a smooth and well-trodden part of the road, 
lie appeared to be in trouble and distress: his favourite abode 
was the topmost part of it, he would hang there for hours to- 
gether, and often, with a low and inward cry, would seem to 
invite me to take notice of him.' — (p. 164.) 

The sloth, in its wild state, spends its life in trees, 
and never leaves them but from force or accident. 
The eagle to the sky, the mole to the ground, the 
sloth to the tree ; but what is most extraordinary, he 
lives not upon the branches, but under them. He 
moves suspended, rests suspended, sleeps suspended, 
and passes his life in suspense — like a young clergy- 
man distantly related to a bishop. Strings of ants 
may be observed, says our good traveller, a mile long, 
each carrying in its mouth a green leaf the size of a 
sixpence .' he does not say whether this is a loyal pro- 
cession, like Oak-apple Day, or for what purpose these 
leaves are carried ; but it appears, while they are car- 
rying the leaves, that three sorts of ant-bears are busy 
in eating them. The habits of the largest of these 
three animals are curious, and to us new. We recom- 
mend the account to the attention of the reader. 

'He is chiefly found in the inmost recesses of the forest, and 
seems partial to the low and swampy parts near creeks, where 
the Troely tree grows. There lie goes up and down in quest 
of ants, of which there is never the least scarcity; so that he 
soon obtains a sufficient supply of food, with very little trouble. 
He cannot travel fast; man is superior to him in speed. With- 
out swiftness to enable him to escape from his enemies, with- 
out teeth, the possession of which would assist him in self-de- 
fence, and without the power of burrowing in the ground, by 
which he might conceal himself from his pursuers, he still is 
capable of ranging through these wilds in perfect safety; nor 
does he fear the fatal pressure of the serpent's fold, or the 
teeth of the famished jaguar. Nature has formed his fore legs 
wonderfully thick, and strong, and muscular, and armed his 
feet with three tremendous sharp and crooked claws. When- 
ever he seizes an animal with these formidable weapons, he 
hugs it close to his body and keeps it there till it dies through 
pressure, or through want of food. Nor does the ant-bear, in 
the mean time, suffer much from loss of aliment, as it is a well- 
known fact, that he can go longer without food than perhaps 
any other animal, except the land tortoise. His skin is of a 
texture that perfectly resists the bite of a dog; his hinder 
parts are protected by thick and shaggy hair, while his im- 
mense tai! is large enough to cover his whole body. 

'The Indians have a great dread of coming in contact with 
the ant-bear ; and after disabling him in the chase, never 



think of approaching him till he be quite dead.'- (pp. 171 
172.) 

The Vampire measures about 26 inches from wing 
to wing. There are two species, large and small. 
The large suck men, and the smaller birds. Mr. W. 
saw some fowls which had been sucked the night be- 
fore, and they were scarcely able to walk. 

'Some years ago I went to the river Paumaron with a 
Scotch gentleman, by name Tarbet. We hung our hammocks 
in the thatched loft of a planter's house. Next morning I heard 
this gentleman muttering iu his hammock, and now and then 
letting fall an imprecation or two, just about the time he ought 
to have been saying his morning prayers. " What is the mat- 
ter, sir ?" said I, softly ; " is any thing amiss V — " What's the 
matter V answered he, surlily ; " why, the vampires have 
been sucking me to death." As soon as there was light enough, 
I went to his hammock, and saw it much stained with blood. 
" There," said he, thrusting his foot out of the hammock, " see 
how these infernal imps have been drawing my life's blood." 
On examining his foot, I found the vampire had tapped his 
great toe : there was a wound somewhat less than that made 
by a leech : the blood was still oozing from it ; I conjectured 
he might have lost from ten to twelve ounces of blood. Whilst 
examining it, I think I put him into a worse humour by re- 
marking, that an European surgeon would not have been so 
generous as to have blooded him without making a charge. 
He looked up in my face, but did not say a word : 1 saw he 
was of opinion that I had better have spared this piece of ill- 
timed levity.' — (pp. 176, 177.) 

The story which follows this account is vulgar, 
nuworth of Mr. Waterton, and should have been 
ommitted. 

Every animal has its enemies. The land tortoise 
has two enemies, men, and the boa-constrictor. The 
natural defence of the tortoise is to draw himself up 
in his shell, and to remain quiet. In this state, the 
tiger, however famished, can do nothing with him, for 
the shell is too strong for the stroke of his paw. Man, 
however, takes him home and roasts hirn — and the 
boa-constrictor swallows him whole, shell and all, and 
consumes him slowly in the interior, as the Court ot 
Chancery does a great estate. 

The danger seems to be much less with snakes and 
wild beasts, if you conduct yourself like a gentleman, 
and are not abruptly intrusive. If you will pass on 
gently, you may walk unhurt within a yard of the 
Labairi snake, who would put you to death if you 
rushed upon him. The taguan knocks you down with 
a blow of his paw, if suddenly interrupted, but will 
run away, if you Avill give him time to do so. In short, 
most animals look upon man as a very ugly customer ; 
and, unless sorely pressed for food, or for fear of their 
own safety, are not fond of attacking him. Mr. Wa- 
terton, though much given to sentiment, made a La- 
bairi snake bite itself, but no bad consequences ensued 
— nor would any bad consequences ensue, if a court- 
martial were to order a sinful soldier to give himself 
a thousand lashes. It is barely possible that the 
snake had some faint idea whom and what he was 
biting. 

Insects are the curse of tropical climates. The bete 
rouge lays the foundation of a tremendous ulcer. In 
a moment 3 r ou are covered with ticks. Chigoes bury 
themselves in your flesh, and hatch a colony of young 
chigoes in a few hours. They will not live together, 
but every chigoe sets up a separate ulcer, and has his 
own private portion of pus. Flies get entry into your 
mouth, into your eyes, into your nose ; you eat flies, 
drink flies, and breathe flies. Lizards, cockroaches, 
and snakes, get into the bed ; ants eat up the books 
scorpions sting you on the foot. Every thing bites, 
stings, or bruises ; every second of your existence you 
are wounded by some piece of animal life that nobody 
has ever seen before, except Swammerdam and Me- 
riam. An insect with eleven legs is swimming in your 
teacup, a nondescript with nine wings is struggling in 
the small beer, or a caterpillar with several dozen 
eyes in his belly is hastening over the bread and but- 
ter ! All nature is alive, and seems to be gathering 
all her entomological hosts to eat you up, as you are 
standing, out of your coat, waistcoat, and breeches. 
Such are the tropics. All this reconciles us to our 
dews, fogs, vapours, and drizzle — to our apothecaries 
rushing about with gargles and tinctures— to our old. 



WANDERINGS IN SOUTH AMERICA. 



168 



British, constitutional coughs, sore throats, and swell- 
ed faces. 

We come now to the counterpart of St. George and 
the Dragon. Every one knows that the large snake of 
tropical climates throws himself upon his prey, twists 
the folds of his body round the victim, presses him to 
death, and then eats him. Mr. Waterton wanted a 
large snake for the sake of his skin ; and it occurred 
to him, that the success of this sort of combat depend- 
ed upon who began first, and that if he could contrive 
to fling himself upon the snake, he was just as likely 
to send the snake to the British Museum, as the snake, 
if allowed the advantage of prior occupation, was to 
eat him up. The opportunities which Yorkshire 
squires have of combating with the boa-constrictor 
are so few, that Mr. Waterton must be allowed to tell 
his own story in his own manner. 

' Wc went slowly on in silence, without moving our arms or 
heads, in order to prevent all alarm as much as possible, lest 
the snake should glide off, or attack us in self-defence. I car- 
ried the lance perpendicularly before me, with the point about 
a foot from the ground. The snake had not moved ; and on 
getting up to him, I struck him with the lance on the near 
side, just behind the neck, and pinned him to the ground. That 
moment the negro next to me seized the lance and held it firm 
in its place, while I dashed head foremost into the den to grap- 
ple with the snake, and to get hold of his tail before he could 
do any mischief. 

'On pinning him to the ground with the lance, he gave a 
tremendous loud hiss, and the little dog ran away, howling as 
he went. We had a sharp fray in the den, the rotten sticks 
flying on all sides, and each party struggling for superiority. 
I called out to the second negro to throw himself upon me, as 
I found I was not heavy enough. He did so, and the additional 
weight was of great service. I had now got firm hold of his 
tail ; and after a violent struggle or two, he gave in, finding 
himself overpowered. This was the moment to secure him. 
So, while the first negro continued to hold the lance firm to the 
ground, and the other was helping me, I contrived to unloose 
my braces, and with them tied up the snake's mouth. 

1 The snake, now finding himself in an unpleasant situation, 
tried to better himself, and set resolutely to work, but we 
overpowered him. We contrived to make him twist himself 
round the shaft of the lance, and then prepared to convey him 
out of the forest. I stood at his head, and. held it firm under 
my arm, one negro supported the belly, and the other the tail. 
In this order we began to move slowly towards home, and 
reached it after resting ten times : for the snake was too heavy 
for us to support him without stopping to recruit our strength. 
As we proceeded onwards with him, he fought hard for free- 
dom, but it was all in vain.'— (pp. 203—204.) 

One of these combats we should have thought suffi- 
cient for glory, and for the interest of the British Mu- 
seum. But Hercules killed two snakes, and Mr. Wa- 
terton would not be content with less. 

'There was a path where timber had formerly been 
dragged along. Here I observed a young coulacanara, ten 
feet long, slowly moving onwards ; I saw he was not thick 
enough to break my arm, in case he got twisted round it. — 
There was not a moment to be lost. I laid hold of his tail 
with the left band, one knee being on the ground ; with the 
right I took off my hat, and held it as you would hold a 
shield for defence. 

<■ The snake instantly turned, and came on at me, with his 
head about a yard from the ground, as if to ask me, what 
business I had to take liberties with his tail. I let him come, 
hissing and open-mouthed, within two feet of my face, and 
then, with all the force I was master of, I drove my fist, 
shielded by my hat, full in his jaws. He was stunned and 
confounded by the blow, and ere he could recover himself, 
T had sojzed his throat with both hands, in such a position 
that he could not bite me ; I then allowed him to coil him- 
self round my body, and marched off with him as my law- 
ful prize. He pressed me hard, but not alarmingly so.' — 
(pp. 206, 207.) 

When the body of the large snake began to smell, 
the vultures immediately arrived. The king of the 
vultures first gorged himself, and then retired to a 
large tree, while his subjects consumed the remainder. 
It does not appear that there was any favouritism. 
When the king was full, all tbe mob vultures ate alike ; 
neither could Mr. Waterton perceive that there was 
any division into Catholic and Protestant vultures, 
or the majority of the flock thought it essentially vul- 
turish to exclude one third of their number from the 
blood and entrails. The vulture, it is remarkable, 
never eats live animals. He seems to ab»H-»r every 



thing which has not the relish of putrescence and fla- 
vour of death. The following is a characteristic spe- 
cimen of the little inconveniences to which travellers 
are liable, who sleep on the feather-beds of the foresx. 
To see a rat in a room in Europe insures a night of 
horror. Every thing is by comparison. 

< About midnight, as I was lying awake, and in great pain, 
I heard the Indian say, "Massa, massa, you nc hear ti- 
ger ?" I listened attentively, and heard the softly sounding 
tread of his feet as he approached us. The moon had gone 
down ; but every now and then we could get a glance of 
him by the light of our fire ; he was the jaguar, for I could 
see the spots on his body. Had I wished to have fired at 
him, I was not able to take sure aim, for I was in such pain 
that I could not turn myself in my hammock. The Indian 
would have fired, but I would not allow him to do so, as I 
wanted to see a little more of our new visitor ; for it is not 
every day or night that the traveller is favoured with an 
undisturbed sight of the jaguar in his own forests. 

1 Whenever the fire got low, the jaguar came a little 
nearer, and when the Indian renewed it, he retired abrupt- 
ly ; sometimes he would come within twenty yards, and 
then we had a view of him, sitting on his hind legs like a 
dog ; sometimes he moved slowly to and fro, and at other 
times we could hear him mend his pace, as if impatient. At 
last the Indian, not relishing the idea of having such com- 
pany in the neighbourhood, could contain himself no longer, 
and set up a most tremendous yell. The jaguar bounded 
off like a race-horse, and returned no more ; it appeared by 
the prints of his feet next morning, that he was a full- 
grown jaguar.' — (pp. 212, 213.) 

We have seen Mr. Waterton fling himself upon a 
snake ; we shall now mount him upon a crocodile, un- 
dertaking that this shall be the last of his feats exhi- 
bited to the reader. He had baited for a cayman or 
crocodile, the hook was swallowed, and the object was 
to pull the animal up and secure him. ' If you pull 
him up,' say the Indians, ' as soon as he sees you on 
the brink of the river, he will run at you and destroy 
you.' • Never mind,' says our traveller, < pull away, 
and leave the rest to me.' And accordingly he places 
himself upon the shore with the mast of the canoe in 
his hand, ready to force it down the throat of the cro- 
dile as soon as he makes his appearance. 

< By the time the cayman was within two yards of me, I 
saw he was in a state of fear and perturbation ; I instantly 
dropped the mast, sprung up, and jumped on his back, turn- 
ing half round as I vaulted, so that I gained my seat with 
my face in a right position. I immediately seized his fore 
legs, and, by main force, twisted them on his back ; thus 
they served me for a bridle. 

< He now seemed to have recovered from his surprise, 
and probably fancying himself in hostile company, he be- 
gan to plunge furiously, and lashed the sand with his long 
and powerful tail. I was out of reach of the strokes of it, 
by being near his head. He continued to plunge and strike, 
and made my seat very uncomfortable. It must have been 
a fine sight for an unoccupied spectator. 

' The people roared out in triumph, and were so vocife- 
rous, that it was some time before they heard me tell them 
to pull me and my beast of burden farther in land. I was 
apprehensive the rope might break, and then there would 
have been every chance of going down to the regions un- 
der water with the cayman. That would have been more 
perilous than Arion's marine morning ride : — 

"Delphini insidens, vada caerula sulcat Arion." 

< The people now dragged us above forty yards on the 
sand ; it was the first and last time I was ever on a cay- 
man's back. Should it be asked how I managed to keep my 
seat, I would answer — I hunted for some years with Lord 
Darlington's fox hounds, —(pp. 231, 232.) 

The Yorkshire gentlemen have long been famous 
for their equestrian skill ; but Mr. Waterton is the first 
among them of whom it could be said, that he has a 
fine hand upon a crocodile. This accursed animal, so 
ridden by Mr. Waterton, is the scourge and terror of 
all the large rivers in South America near the line. 
Their boldness is such, that a cayman has sometimes 
come out of the Oroonoque, at Angustura, near the 
public walks where the people were assembled, seized 
a full-grown man, as big as Sir William Curtis after 
dinner, and hurried him into the bed of the river for 
his food. The governor of Angustura witnessed this 
circumstance himself. 

Our Eboracic traveller had now been nearly eleven 
months in the desert, and not in vain. Shall we ex- 



164 



WORKS OF THE REV. SIDNEY SMITH. 



press our doubts, or shall we confidently state at once 
the immense wealth he had acquired f— a prodigious 
variety of insects, two hundred and thirty birds, ten 
land-tortoises, five armadillos, two large serpents, a 
sloth, an ant-bear, and a cayman. At Liverpool, the 
custom-house officers, men ignorant of Linnaeus, got 
hold of his collection, detained it six weeks, and in 
spite of remonstrances to the treasury, he was forced 
to pay very high duties. This is really perfectly ab- 
surd ; that a man of science cannot bring a pickled 
armadillo, for a collection of natural history, without 
paying a tax for it. This surely must have happened 
In the dark days of Nicolas. We cannot doubt but that 
such paltry exactions have been swept away, by the 
manly and liberal policy of Robinson and Huskisson. 
That a great people should compel an individual to 
make them a payment before he can be permitted to 
land a stuffed snake upon their shores, is, of all the 
paltry custom house robberies, we ever heard of, the 
most mean and contemptible — but Major rerum ordo 
nascitur. 

The fourth journey of Mr. Waterton is to the United 
States. It is pleasantly written ; but our author does 
not appear as much at home among men as among 
beasts. Shooting, stuffing and pursuing are his occu- 
pations. He is lost in places where there are no bushes, 
snakes, nor Indians — but he is full of good feeling 
wherever he goes. We cannot avoid introducing the 
following passage : — 

« The steamboat from Quebec to Montreal had above five 
hundred Irish emigrants on board. They were going " they 
hardly knew whither," far away from dear Ireland. It 
made one's heart ache to see them all huddled together, 
without any expectation of ever revisiting their native soil. 
We feared that the sorrow of leaving home for ever, the 
miserable accommodations on hoard the ship which had 
brought them away, and the tossing of the angry ocean, in 
a long and dreary voyage, would have rendered them cal- 
lous to good behaviour. But it was quite otherwise. They 
conducted themselves with great propriety. Every Ameri- 
can on board seemed to feel for them. And then " they 
were so full of wretchedness. Need and oppression stared 
within their eyes. Upon their backs hung ragged misery. 
The world was not their friend." "Poor, dear Ireland," 
exclaimed an aged female, as I was talking to her, "I shall 
never see it any more !" ' — (pp. 259, 260.) 

And thus it is in every region of the earth ! There 
is no country where an Englishman can set his foot, 
that he does not meet these miserable victims of Eng- 
lish cruelty and oppression — banished from their coun- 
try by the stupidity, bigotry, and meanness of the 
English people, who trample on their liberty and con- 
science, because each man is afraid in another reign, 
of being out of favour, and losing his share in the spoil. 

We are always glad to see America praised (slavery 
excepted). And yet there is still, we fear, a party in 
this country, who are glad to pay their court to the 
timid and the feeble, by sneering at this great specta- 
cle of human happiness. We never think of it without 
considering it as a great lesson to the people of Eng- 
land, to look into their own affairs, to watch and sus- 
pect their rulers, and not to be defrauded of happiness 
and money by pompous names and false pretences. 

" « Our western brother is in possession of a country replete 
with every thing that can contribute to the happiness and 
comfort of mankind. His code of laws, purified by expe- 
rience and common sense, has fully answered the expecta- 
tions of the public. By acting up to the true spirit of this 
code, he has reaped immense advantages from it. His ad- 
vancement, as a nation, has been rapid beyond all calcula- 
tion ; and, young as he is, it may be remarked without any 
impropriety, that he is now actually reading a salutary les- 
son to the rest of the civilized world.' — (p. 273.) 

Now, what shall we say, after all, of Mr. Waterton ? 
That he has spent a great part of his life in wandering 
in the wild scenes he describes, and that he describes 
them with entertaining zeal and real feeling. His 
stories draw largely sometimes on our faith ; but a 
man who lives in the woods of Cayenne must do many 
odd things — things utterly unknown to the dwellers in 
Hackney and Highgate. We do not want to rein up 
Mr. Waterton too tightly — because we are convinced 
he goes best with his head free. But a little less of 
apostrophe, and some faint suspicion of his own pow- 



ers of humour, would improve this gentleman's style. 
As it is, he has a considerable talent at describing 
He abounds with good feeling ; and has written a very 
entertaining book, which hurries the reader out of his 
European parlour, into the heart of tropical forests, 
and gives, over the rules and the cultivation of the 
civilized parts of the earth, a momentary superiority 
to the freedom of the savage, and the wild beauties of 
nature. We honestly recommend the book to our 
readers : it is well worth the perusal. 



MAN TRAPS AND SPRING GUNS. (Edinburgh 
Review, 1821.) 

Reportt of Cases argued, and determined in the Court of King's 
Bench, in Hilary Term, 60th Geo. III. 1820. By Richard 
V. Barnewall, of Lincoln's Inn, Esq. Barrister-at-Law, and 
Edward H. Alderson, of the Inner Temple, Esq. Barrister- 
at-Law. Vol. III. Part II. London, 1820. 

Most of our readers will remember, that we very 
lately published an article upon the use of steel traps 
and spring guns ; and, in the course of discussion, had 
occasion to animadvert upon the report of Mr. Justice 
Best's judgment, in the case of Ilott and Wilkes, as 
reported in Chetwynd's Edition of Burn's Justice, pub- 
lished in the spring of the present year. In the Morn- 
ing Chronicle, of the 4th of June, 1821, Mr. Justice 
Best is reported to have made the following observa- 
tions in the King's Bench : — 

< Mr. Justice Best said, Mr. Chetwynd's book having been 
mentioned by my learned brother Bayley, I must take this 
opportunity, not without some pain, of adverting to what I 
am reported, in his work, to have said in the case of Ilott 
v. Wilkes, and of correcting a most gross misrepresentation. 
I am reported to have concurred with the other judges, and 
to have delivered my judgment at considerable length, and 
then to have said, "This case has been discussed at the bar, 
as if these engines were exclusively resorted to for the pro- 
tection of game ; but I consider them as lawfully applicable 
to the protection of every species of property against un- 
lawful trespassers." This is not what I stated; but the part 
which I wish more particularly to deny, as ever having 
said, or even conceived, is this — " But if even they might 
not lawfully be used for the protection of game, I, for one, 
should be extremely glad to adopt such means, if they were 
found sufficient for that purpose." I confess I am surprised 
that this learned person should suppose, from the note of 
any one, that any person who ever sat in a court of justice 
as a judge could talk such wicked nonsense as I am made 
to talk; "and I am surprised that he should venture to give 
the authority he does for what he has published; for I find, 
that the reference he gives in the appendix to his book is 3 
Barn, and Aid. 304, where there is a correct report of that 
case, and where it will be found that every word uttered 
by me is directly contrary to what I am supposed, by Mr. 
Chetwynd's statement of the case, to have said. I don't 
trouble the court with reading the whole of what I did say 
on that occasion, but I will just say that I said — "My brother 
Bayley has illustrated this case by the question which he 
asked, namely, Can you indict a man for putting spring 
guns in his enclosed field ? I think the question put by 
Lord Chief Justice Gibbs, in the case of Dean v. Clayton, in 
the Common Pleas, a still better illustration, viz. Can you 
justify entering into enclosed lands to take away guns so 
set ? If both these questions must be answered in the nega- 
tive, it cannot be unlawful to set spring guns in an enclosed 
field, at a distance from any road, giving such notice that 
they are set, as to render it in the highest degree probable 
that all persons in the neighbourhood must know that they 
are so set. Humanity requires that the fullest notice pos- 
sible should be given ; and the law of England will not 
sanction what is inconsistent with humanity." A popular 
work has quoted this report from Mr. Chetwynd's work, 
but has omitted this important line (which omission reminds 
one of the progress of a thing, the name of which one does 
not choose to mention,) "that I had concurred in what had 
fallen from the other judges ;" and omitting that line, they 
state, that one had said, " It is my opinion, that with notice, 
or without notice, this might be done." Now, concurring 
with the other judges, it is impossible I should say that. It 
is right that this should be corrected, not that I entertain 
any angry feeling, for too much time has elapsed since then 
for any anger to remain on my mind; but all I claim, with 
respect to the observations made in that work, severe as 
they are, (and I, for one, feel that I should deserve no 
mercy if I should ever entertain such doctrines,) is, that I 
may not be misrepresented. It is not necessary for me, in 
this place, to say, that no man entertains more horror of the 
doctrine I am supposed to have laid down than I do, that 



MAN TRAPS AND SPRING GUNS. 



166 



the life of man is to be treated lightly and indifferently, in 
comparison with the preservation of game, and the amuse- 
ment of sporting; that the laws of humanity are to be 
violated ior the sake merely of preserving the amusement 
of game. I am sure no man can justly impute to me such 
wicked doctrines. It is unnecessary for me to say, that I 
entertain no such sentiments ; and therefore I hope I shall 
be excused, not on account of my own feelings, but as far 
as the public are interested in the character of a judge, in 
saying, that no person should blame a judge for what has 
been unjustly put into his mouth.' 

His lordship's speech is reported in the New Times 
of the same date, as follows : — 

'Mr. Justice Best said, " My brother Bayley has quoted 
Mr. Chetwynd's edition of Burn: I am surprised that the 
learned author of that work should have made me talk 
such mischievous nonsense, as he has given to the public, in 
a report of my judgment, in the case of Ilott and Wilkes. 
I am still more surprised, that he should have suffered this 
judgment to remain uncorrected, after he had seen a true 
report of the case in Bamwall and Alderson, to which re- 
port he has referred in his appendix." Mr. Chetwynd's 
report has the following passage : " Mr. Justice Best con- 
curred with the other judges." His lordship concluded as 
follows : — " This case has been discussed at the bar, as if 
these inquiries were exclusively resorted to for the protec- 
tion of game ; but I considered them as lawfully applicable 
to the protection of every species of property against un- 
lawful trespassers. But if even they might not lawfully be 
vscdfor the protection of game, I for one should be extremely 
glad to adopt such measures, if they were found sufficient for 
that purpose." 

'A popular periodical work contains the passage just cited, 
with the omission of the words " concurred with the other 
judges." Of this omission I have reason to complain, because, 
if it had been inserted, the writer of the article could not have 
said, "It follows, that a man may put his fellow-creatures to 
death for any infringement of his property, for picking the 
sloes and blackberries off his hedges ; for breaking a few dead 
sticks out of them by night or by day, with resistance or with- 
out resistance, with warning or without warning." The 
judges with whom Mr. Chetwynd makes me concur in opinion, 
all give their judgment on the ground of due notice being given. 
I do not complain of the other observations contained in this 
work ; they would have been deserved by me had I ever ut- 
tered such an opinion as the report of Mr. Chetwynd has 
stated me to have delivered. The whole of what I said will 
be found to be utterly inconsistent with the statement, by 
those who will read the case in " Barnewall and Alderson." I 
will only trouble the court with the passage which will be 
found in the report of my judgment, in " 3 Barnewall and Al- 
derson, 319 :" — " It cannot be unlawful to set spring guns in an 
enclosed field, at a distance from any road, giving such notice 
that they are set, as to render it in the highest degree probable 
that all persons in the neighbourhood must know that they 
are so set. Humanity required that the fullest notice possible 
should be given ; and the law of England will not sanction 
what is inconsistent with humanity." I have taken the first 
©pportunity of saying this, because I think it of importance to 
the public that such a misrepresentation of the opinion of one 
of the judges should not be circulated without some notice.' 

We -subjoin the report of Messrs. Barnewall and 
Alderson, here alluded to, and allowed by Mr. Justice 
Best to be correct. 

' Best J. The act of the plaintiff could only occasion mere 
nominal damage to the wood of the defendant. The injury 
that the plaintiff's trespass has brought upon himself is ex- 
tremely severe. In such a case, one cannot, without pain, 
decide against the action. But we must not allow our feelings 
to induce us to lose sight of the principles which are essential 
to the rights of property. The prevention of intrusion upon 
property is one of these rights; and every proprietor is 
allowed to use the force that is absolutely necessary to vindi- 
cate it. If he uses more than is absolutely necessary, he ren- 
ders himself responsible for all the consequences of the excess. 
Thus, if a man comes on my land, I cannot lay hands on him to 
remove him until I have desired him to go off. If he will not 
depart on request, I cannot proceed immediately to beat 
him, but must endeavour to push him off. If he is too power- 
ful for me, I cannot use a dangerous weapon, but must first call 
in aid other assistance. I am speaking of out-door property, 
and of cases in which no felony is to be apprehended. It is 
evident, also, that this doctrine is only applicable to trespasses 
committed in the presence of the owner of the property tres- 
passed on. When the owner and his servants are absent at 
the time of the trespass, it can only be repelled by the terror 
of spring-guns, or other instruments of the same kind. There 
is in such case no possibility of proportioning the resisting 
force to the obstinacy and violence of the trespasser, as the 
owner of the close may and is required to do where he is pre- 
sent. There is no distinction between the mode of defence of 



one species of out-door property and another, (except in cases 
where the taking or breaking into the property amounts to 
felony.) If the owner of woods cannot set spring-guns in his 
wood, the owner of an orchard, or of a field with potatoes or 
turnips, or auy other crop usually the object of plunder, can- 
not set them in such field. How, then, are these kinds of pro- 
perty to be protected, at a distance from the residence of the 
owner, in the night, and in the absence of his servants ? It has 
been said that the law has provided remedies for any injuries 
to such things by action. But the offender must be detected 
before he can be subjected to an action ; and the expense of con- 
tinual watching for this purpose would often exceed the value 
of the property to be protected. If we look at the subject in 
this point of view, we may find amongst poor tenants, who are 
prevented from paying their rents by the plunder of their 
crops, men who are more objects of our compassion than the 
wanton trespasser, who brings on himself the injury which he 
suffers. If an owner of a close cannot set spring-guns, he can 
put glass bottles or spikes on the top of a wall, or even have a 
savage dog, to prevent persons from entering his yard. It has 
been said, in argument, that you may see the glass bottles or 
spikes ; and it is admitted, that if the exact spot where these 
guns are set was pointed out to the trespasser, he could not 
maintain any action for the injury he received from one of 
them. As to seeing the glass bottles or spikes, that must de- 
pend on the circumstance whether it be light or dark at the 
time of the trespass. But what difference does it make, whe- 
ther the trespasser be told the gun is set in such a spot, or that 
there are guns in different parts of such a field, if he has no 
right to go on any part of that field? It is absurd to say you 
may set the guns, provided you tell the trespasser exactly 
where they are set, because then the setting them could answer 
no purpose. My brother Bayley has illustrated this case, by 
the question which he asked, namely, Can you indict a man for 
putting spring-guns in his enclosed field ? I think the question 
put by Lord C. J. Gibbs, in the case of the Common Pleas, a 
still better illustration, viz., Can you justify entering into 
enclosed lands, to take away guns so set? If both these ques- 
tions must be answered in the negative, it cannot be unlawful 
to set spring-guns in an enclosed field, at a distance from any 
road, giving such notice that they are set as to render it in the 
highest degree probable that all persons in the neighbourhood 
must know that they are so set. Humanity requires that the 
fullest notice possible should be given ; and the law of England 
will not sanction what is inconsistent with humanity. It has 
been said in argument, that it is a principle of law, that you 
cannot do indirectly what you are not permitted to do directly. 
This principle is not applicable to the case. You cannot shoot 
a man that comes on your land, because you may turn him off 
by means less hurtful to him ; and, therefore, if you saw him 
walking in your field, and were to invite him to proceed on 
his walk, knowing that he must tread on a wire, and so shoot 
himself with a spring-gun, you would be liable to all the conse- 
quences that would follow. The invitation to him to pursue 
his walk is doing indirectly what, by drawing the trigger of a 
gun with your own hand, is done directly. But the case is just 
the reverse, if, instead of inviting him to walk on your land, 
you tell him to keep off, and warn him of what will follow if he 
does not. It is also said, that it is a maxim of law, that you 
must so use your property as not to injure another's. This 
maxim I admit ; but I deny its application to the case of a 
man'who comes to trespass on my property. It applies only 
to cases where a man has only a transient property, such as in 
the air or water that passes over his land, and which he must 
not corrupt by nuisance ; or where a man has a qualified pro- 
perty, as in land near another's ancient windows, or in land 
over which another has a right of waj r . In the first case, he 
must do nothing on his land to stop the light of the windows, 
or, in the second, to obstruct the way. This case has been 
argued, as if it appeared in it that the guns were set to pre 
serve game ; but that is not so : they were set to prevent tres- 
passes on the lands of the defendant. Without, however, saying 
in whom the property of game is vested, I say that a man has 
a right to keep persons off his lands, in order to preserve the 
game. Much money is expended in the protection of game ; 
and it would be hard if, in one night, when the keepers are 
absent, a gang of poachers might destroy what has been kept 
at so much cost. If you do not allow men of landed estates to 
preserve their game, you will not prevail on them to reside in 
the country. Their poor neighbours will thus lose their pro- 
tection and kind offices ; and the government the support that 
it derives from an independent, enlightened, and unpaid ma- 
gistracy.' 

As Mr. Justice Best denies that he did say what a 
very respectable and grave law publication reported 
him to have said, and as Mr. Chetwynd and his re- 
porter have made no attempt to vindicate their report, 
of course our observations cease to be applicable. 
There is certainly nothing in the term report of Mr. 
Justice Best's speech which calls for any degree of 
moral criticism ; nothing but what a respectable and 
temperate judge might fairly have uttered. Had such 



WORKS OF THE REV. SIDNE V SMITH. 



been the report cited in Burn, it never would have 
drawn from us one syallable of reprehension. 

We beg leave, however, to observe, that we have 
never said that it was Mr. Justice Best's opinion, as 
reported in Chetwynd, that a man might be put to 
death without notice, but without warning ; by which 
we meant a very different thing. If notice was given 
on boards, that certain grounds were guarded by 
watchmen with fire arms, the watchmen, feeling per- 
haps some little respect for human life, would proba- 
bly call out to the man to stand and deliver himself 
up ; — ' Stop, or I'll shoot you !' ' Stand, or you are a 
dead man ." — or some such compunctious phrases as 
the law compels living machines to use. But the trap 
can give no such warning — can present to the intruder 
no alternative of death or surrender. Now these dif- 
ferent modes of action in the dead or the living guard, 
is what we alluded to in the words without warning. 
We meant to characterize the ferocious, unrelenting 
nature of the means used — and the words are perfectly 
correct and applicable, after all the printed notices in 
the world. Notice is the communication of something 
about to happen, after some little interval of time. 
Warning is the communication of some imminent dan- 
ger. Nobody gives another notice that he will imme- 
diately shoot him through the head — or warns him 
that he will be a dead man in less than thirty years. 
This, and not the disingenuous purpose ascribed to us 
by Mr. Justice Best, is the explanation of the offend- 
ing words. We are thoroughly aware that Mr. Justice 
Best was an advocate for notice, and never had the 
most distant intention of representing his opinion 
otherwise : and we really must say, that (if the report 
had heen correct) there never was a judicial speech 
where there was so little necessity for having recourse 
to the arts of misrepresentation. We? are convinced, 
however, that the report is not correct — and we are 
heartily glad it is not. There is in the Morning 
Chronicle an improper and offensive phrase, which 
(now we know Mr. Justice Best's style better) we 
shall attribute to the reporters, and pass over without 
further notice. It would seem, from the complaint of 
the learned judge, that we had omitted something in 
the middle of the quotation from Chetwynd ; whereas 
we have quoted every word of the speech as Chetwynd 
has given it, and only began our quotation after the 
preliminary observations, because we had not the 
most distant idea of denying that Mr. Justice Best 
considered ample notice as necessary to the legality 
of these proceedings. 

There are passages in the Morning Chronicle alrea- 
dy quoted, and in the term report, which we must 
take the liberty of putting in juxtaposition to each 
other. 



Mr. Justice Best in the Term Reports, 
Bamewall and Alderson. 



Mr. Justice Best in 
the MorningChro- 
nicle of the teh of 
June, 1821. 



It is not necessa- When the owner and his servants 
ry for me in this are absent at the time of the trespass, 
place to say, that it can only be repelled by the terror of 
no man entertains spring guns, or other instruments of 
more horror of the the same kind. There is in such cases, 
doctrine I am sup- no possibility of proportioning the re- 
posed to have laid sisting force to the obstinacy and vio- 
down, than I do, lence of the trespasser, as the owner of 
that the life of man the close may, and is required to do, 
is to be treated when he is present. — 317. 
lightly and indif- Without saying in whom the proper- 
ferently, in com- ty of game is vested, I say that a man 
parison with the has a right to keep persons off his lands, 
preservation of in order to preserve the game. Much 
game and the a- money is expended on the protection 
musement of sport- of game; and it would be hard if, in 
ing — that the laws one night, when the keepers are absent, 
of humanity are to a gang of poachers might destroy what 
be violated for the has been kept at so much cost. — 320. 
sake merely of pre- If an owner of a close cannot set 
serving the amuse- spring guns, he cannot put glass bottles 
ment of game. I or spikes on the top of a wall.— 318. 
am sure no man If both these questions must be an- 
can justly impute swered in the negative, it cannot be 
to me such wicked unlawful to set spring guns in an en- 
doctrines ; it is un- closed field, at a distance from any 
necessary for me road ; giving such notice that they are 



to say I entertain set, as to render it in the highest do- 
no such sentiments, gree probable that all persons in the 
In Bamewall and neighbourhood must know they are so ) 
Alderson there is a set. Humanity required that the ful- 
correct report of lest notice possible should be given; 
that case. — Morn, and the law of England will not sane 
Chron. tion what is inconsistent with human 

ity. — BarnewaU and Alderson. — 319. 

There is, perhaps, some little inconsistency in these 
opposite extracts ; but we have not the smallest wish 
to insist upon it. We are thoroughly and honestly 
convinced, that Mr. Justice Best's horror at the de- 
struction of human life for the mere preservation of 
game is quite sincere. It is impossible, indeed, that 
any human being, of common good nature, could en- 
tertain a different feeling upon the subject, when it is 
earnestly pressed upon him ; and though, perhaps, 
there may be judges upon the bench more remarkable 
for imperturbable apathy, we never heard Mr. Justice 
Best accusedof ill nature. In condescending to notice 
our observations, in destroying the credit of Chct- 
wynd's report, and in withdrawing the canopy of his 
name from the bad passions of country gentlemen, he 
has conferred a real favour upon the public. 

Mr. Justice Best, however, must excuse us for say- 
ing, that we are not in the slightest degree convinced 
by his reasoning. We shall suppose a fifth judge to 
have delivered his opinion in the case of Ilott against 
Wilkes, and to have expressed himself in the follow- 
ing manner. But we must caution Mr. Chetwynd 
against introducing this fifth judge in his next edition 
of Burn's justice ; and we assure him that he is only 
an imaginary personage. 

' My brother Best justly observes, that prevention 
of intrusion upon private property is a right which 
«rery proprietor may act upon, and use force to vin- 
dicate — the force absolutely necessary for such vindi- 
cation. If any man intrude upou another's lands, the 
proprietor must first desire him to go off, then lay 
hands upon the intruder, then push him off; and if 
that will not do, call in aid other assistance, before 
he uses a dangerous weapon. If the proprietor uses 
more force than is absolutely necessary, he renders 
himself responsible for all the consequences of the ex- 
cess. In this doctrine I cordially concur ; and admire 
(I am sure, with him) the sacred regard which our 
law every where exhibits for the life and safety of 
man — its tardiness and reluctance to proceed to ex- 
treme violence : but my learned brother then observes 
as follows ; — " It is evident, also, that this doctrine is 
only applicable to trespasses committed in the pre- 
sence of the owner of the property trespassed upon 
When the owner and his servants are absent at the 
time of the trespass, it can only be repelled by the 
terror of spring guns, or other instruments of the same 
kind." If Mr. Justice Best means, by the terror of 
the spring guns, the mere alarm that the notice ex- 
cites — or the powder without the bullets — noise with- 
out danger — it is not worth while to raise an argument 
upon the point ; for, absent or present, notice or no 
notice, such means must always be lawful. But if my 
brother Best means that in the absence of the propri- 
etor, the intruder may be killed by such instruments 
after notice, this is a doctrine to which I never ca;: 
assent ; because it rests the life and security of the 
trespasser upon the accident of the proprietor' s pre 
sence. In that presence there must be a most cauti 
ous and nicely graduated scale of admonition ano 
harmless compulsion ; the feelings and safety of th< 
intruder are to be studiously consulted ; but if business 
or pleasure call the proprietor away, the intruder maj 
be instantly shot dead by the machinery. Such a 
state of law, I must be permitted to say, is too incon- 
gruous for this or any other country. 

1 If the alternative is the presence of the owner and 
his servants or such dreadful consequences as these, 
why are the owner or his servants allowed to be ab- 
sent ? If the ultimate object in preventing such intru- 
sions is pleasure in sporting, it is better that pleasure 
should be rendered more expensive, than that the life 
of man should be rendered so precarious. But why is 
it impossible to proportion the resisting force to the 
obstinacy of the trespasser in the absence of the pro. 



MAN TRAPS AND SPRING GUNS. 



167 



prietor ? Why may not an intruder be let gently down 
into five feet of liquid mud ? — why not caught in a box 
which shall detain him till the next morning ? — why 
not held in a toothless trap till the proprietor arrives ? 
— such traps as are sold in all the iron shops in this 
city ? We are bound, according to my brother Best, 
to inquire if these means have been previously resort- 
ed to ; for upon his own principle, greater violence 
must not be used, where less will suffice for the remo- 
val of the intruder. 

' There are crops, I admit, of essential importance 
to agriculture, which will not bear the expense of vigi- 
lance ; and if there are districts where such crops are 
exposed to such serious and disheartening depreda- 
tion, that may be a good reason for additional severity 
of the legislator, and not of the proprietor. If the le- 
gislature enacts fine and imprisonment as the punish- 
ment for stealing turnips, it is not to be endured that 
the proprietor should award to this crime the pun- 
ishment of death. If the fault is not sufficiently pre- 
vented by the punishments already in existence, he 
must wait till the frequency and flagrancy of the of- 
fence attract the notice, and stimulate the penalties of 
those who make laws. He must not make laws (and 
those very bloody laws) for himself. 

' I do not say that the setter of the trap or gun al- 
lures the trespasser into it ; but I say that the punish- 
ment he intends for the man who trespasses after no- 
tice is death. He covers his spring gun with furze 
and heath, and gives it the most natural appearance 
he can ; and in that gun he places the slugs by which 
he means to kill the trespasser. This killing of an 
unchallenged, unresisting person, I really cannot help 
considering to be as much murder as if the proprietor 
had shot the trespasser with his gun. Giving it all 
the attention in my power, I am utterly at a loss to 
distinguish between the two cases. Does it signify 
whose hand or whose foot pulls the string which moves 
the trigger? — the real murderer is he who prepares 
the instrument of death, and places it in a position 
that such hand or foot may touch it for the purposes 
of destruction. My brother Holroyd says, the tres- 
passer who has had a notice of guns being set in the 
wood is the real voluntary agent who pulls the trigger. 
But I most certainly think that he is not. He is the 
animal agent, but not the rational agent — he does not 
intend to put himself to death ; but he foolishly trusts 
in the chance of escaping, and is any thing but a vp- 
luntary agent in firing the gun. If a trespasser were 
to rush into a wood meaning to seek his own destruc- 
tion — to hunt for the wire, and when found, to pull it, 
he would indeed be the agent in the most philosoph'- 
cal sense of the word. But, after entering the wood, 
he does all he can to avoid the gun — keeps clear of 
every suspicious place, and is baffled only by the su- 
perior cunning of him who planted the gun. How the 
firing of the gun then can be called his act — his volun- 
tary act — I am at a loss to conceive. The practice 
has unfortunately become so common, that the first 
person convicted for such a murder, and acting under 
the delusion of right, might be a fit object of royal 
mercy. Still, in my opinion, such an act must legally 
be considered as murder. 

' It has been asked, if it be an indictable offence to 
set such guns in a man's own ground ; but let me first 
put a much greater question — Is it murder to kill any 
man with such instruments ? If it is, it must be in- 
dictable to set them. To place an instrument for the 
purpose of committing murder, and to surrender (as in 
such cases you must surrender) all control over its 
operation, is clearly an indictable offence. 

'All my brother judges have delivered their opinions 
as if these guns were often set for the purposes of ter- 
ror, and not of destruction. To this I can only say, 
that the moment any man puts a bullet into the spring 
gun, he has some other purpose than that of terror ; 
and if he does not put a bullet there, he never can be 
the subject of argument in this court. 

' My Lord Chief Justice can see no distinction be- 
tween the case of tenter-hooks upon a wall, and the 
placing of spring guns, as far as the lawfulness of both 
is concerned. But the distinctions I take between the 
case ol tentei-hooks upon a wall, and the setting of 



spring guns, are founded — 1st, in the magnitude of the 
evil inflicted ; 2ndly, in the great difference of the no- 
tice which the trespasser receives ; 3dly, in the very 
different evidence of criminal intention in the trespass- 
er; 4thly, in the greater value of the property in- 
vaded ; 5thly, in the greater antiquity of the abuse. 
To cut the fingers, or to tear the hand, is of course a 
more pardonable injury than to kill. The trespasser, 
in the day-time, sees the spikes ; and by day or night, 
at all events, he sees or feels the wall. It is impossi- 
ble he should not understand the nature of such a pro- 
hibition, or imagine that his path lies over this wall; 
whereas the victim of the spring gun may have gone 
astray, may not be able to read, or may first cross the 
armed soil in the night time, when he cannot read ; — 
and so he is absolutely without any notice at all. In 
the next place, the slaughtered man may be perfectly 
innocent in his purpose, which the scaler of the walls 
cannot be. No man can get to the top of a garden 
wall without a criminal purpose. A garden, by the 
common consent and feeling of mankind, contains 
more precious materials than a wood or a field, and 
may seem to justify a greater jealousy and care. 
Lastly, and for these reasons, perhaps, the practice of 
putting spikes and glass bottles has prevailed for this 
century past; and the right so to do has become, from 
time, and the absence of cases, (for the plaintiff', in 
such a case, must acknowledge himself a thief,) inve- 
terate. But it is quite impossible, because in some 
trifling instances, and in much more pardonable cir- 
cumstances, private vengeance has usurped upon the 
province of law, that I can, from such slight abuses, 
confer upon private vengeance the power of life and 
death. On the contrary, I think it my imperious duty 
to contend, that punishment for such offences as these 
is to be measured by the law, and not by the exagger- 
ated notions which any individual may form of the 
importance of his own pleasures. It is my duty, in- 
stead of making one abuse a reason for another, to re- 
call the law back to its perfect state, and to restrain 
as much as possible the invention and use of private 
punishments. Indeed, if this wild sort of justice is to 
be tolerated, I see no sort of use in the careful adapta- 
tion of punishments to crimes, in the humane labours 
of the lawgiver. Every lord of a manor is his own 
Lycurgus, or rather his own Draco, and the great pur- 
pose of civil life is defeated. Inter nova tormentorum 
genera machinasque exitiales, silent leges. 

< Whatever be the law, the question of humanity is 
a separate question. I shall not slate all I think of 
that person who, for the preservation of game, would 
doom the innocent — or the guilty intruder, to a sudden 
death. I will not, however (because I am silent re- 
specting individuals), join in any undeserved panegy- 
ric of the humanity of the English law. I cannot say, 
at the same moment, that the law of England allows 
such machines to be set after public notice ; and that 
the law of England sanctions nothing but what is hu- 
mane. If the law sanctions such practices, it sanc- 
tions, in my opinion, what is to the last degree odious, 
unchristian, and inhumane. 

' The case of the dog or bull I admit to be an ana- 
logous case to this : and I say, if a man were to keep 
a dog of great ferocity and power, for the express pur- 
pose of guarding against trespass in woods or fields, 
and that dog was to kill a trespasser, it would be mur- 
der in the person placing him there for such a purpose 
It is indifferent to me whether the trespasser is slain 
by animals or machines intentionally brought there for 
that purpose : he ought not to be slain at all. It is 
murder to use such a punishment for such an offence. 
If a man puts a ferocious dog in his yard, to guard his 
house from burglary, and that dog strays into the 
neighbouring field and there worries the man, there 
wants, in this case, the murderous and malicious spi- 
rit. The dog was placed in the yard for the legal pur- 
pose of guarding the house against burglary ; for which 
crime, if caught in the act of perpetrating it, a man 
may legally be put to death. There was no primary 
intention here of putting a mere trespasser to death 
So, if a man keep a ferocious bull, not for agricultural 
purposes, but for the express purpose of repelling tres- 
passers, and that bull occasion the death of a trespass- 



168 



WORKS OF THE REV. SIDNEY SMITH. 



er, it is murder : the intentional infliction of death by 
any means for such sort of offences, constitutes the mur- 
der : a right to kill for such reasons cannot be acquired 
by the foolhardiness of the trespasser, nor by any sort 
of notice or publicity. If a man were to blow a trum- 
pet all over the country, and say that he would shoot 
any man who asked him how he did, would he acquire 
a right to do so by such notice ? Does mere publica- 
tion of an unlawful intention make the action lawful 
which follows? If notice is the principle which con- 
secrates this mode of destroying human beings, I wish 
my brothers had been a little more clear, or a little 
more unanimous, as to what is meant by this notice. 
Must the notice be always actual, or is it sufficient 
that it is probable ? May these guns act only against 
those who have read the notice, or against all who 
might have read the notice ? The truth is, that the 
practice is so enormous, and the opinions of the most 
learned men so various, that a declaratory law upon 
the subject is imperiously required.* Common hu- 
manity required it after the extraordinary difference 
of opinion which occurred in the case of Dean and 
Clayton. 

' For these reasons, I am compelled to differ from 
my learned brothers. We have all, I am sure, the 
common object of doing justice in such cases as these; 
we can have no possible motive for doing otherwise. 
Where such a superiority of talents and numbers is 
against me I must of course be wrong ; but I think it 
better to publish my own errors than to subscribe to 
opinions of the justice of which I am not convinced. 
To destroy a trespasser with such machines, I think 
would be murder ; to set such uncontrollable machines 
for the purpose of committing this murder, I think 
would be indictable ; and I am, therefore, of opinion, 
that he who suffers from such machines, has a fair 
ground of action, in spite of any notice ; for it is not 
in the power of notice to make them lawful.' 



HAMILTON'S METHOD OF TEACHING LAN- 
GUAGES. (Edinburgh Review, 1826.) 

1. The Gospel of St. John, in Latin, adapted to the Hamilto- 
nian System, by an Analytical and Interlineary Translation. 
Executed under the immediate direction of James Ham- 
ilton. London, 1824. 

2. The Gospel of St. John, adapted to the Hamiltonian Sys- 
tem, by an Analytical and Interlineary Translation from the 
Italian, with full Instructions for its use, even by those who 
are wholly ignorant of the Language. For the use of Schools. 
By James Hamilton, Author of the Hamiltonian System. 
London, 1825. 

We have nothing whatever to do with Mr. Hamil- 
ton personally. He may be the wisest or the weakest 
of men ; most dexterous or most unsuccessful in the 
exhibition of his system ; modest and proper, or pruri- 
ent and preposterous in its commendation : by none 
of these considerations is his system itself affected. 

The proprietor of Ching's Lozenges must necessa- 
rily have recourse to a newspaper, to rescue from ob- 
livion the merit of his vermifuge medicines. In the 
same manner, the Amboyna tooth-powder must de- 
pend upon the Herald and the Morning Post. Unfor- 
tunately, the system of Mr. Hamilton has been 
introduced to the world by the same means, and has 
exposed itself to those suspicions which hover over 
splendid discoveries of genius, detailed in the daily 
papers, and sold in sealed boxes at an infinite diversity 
of prices — but with a perpetual inclusion of the stamp, 
and with an equitable discount for undelayed pay- 
ment. 

It may have been necessary for Mr. Hamilton to 
have had recourse to these means of making known 
his discoveries, since he may not have had friends 
whose names and authority might have attracted the 
notice of the public ; but it is a misfortune to which 
his system has been subjected, and a difficulty which 
; ,t has still to overcome. There is also a singular and 
somewhat ludicrous condition of giving warranted les- 

* This has been done. 



sons ; by which is meant, we presume, that the money 
is to be returned, if the progress is not made. We 
should be curious to know how poor Mr. Hamilton 
would protect himself from some swindling scholar, 
who, having really learnt all that the master professed 
to teach, should counterfeit the grossest ignorance of 
the Gospel of St. John, and refused to construe a sin- 
gle verse, or pay a farthing ? 

Whether Mr. Hamilton's translations are good or 
bad, is not the question. The point to determine is, 
whether very close interlineal translations are helps in 
learning a language ? Not whether Mr. Hamilton has 
executed these translations faithfuDy and judiciously. 
Whether Mr. Hamilton is or is not the inventor of the 
system which bears his name, and what his claims to 
originality may be, are also questions of very second- 
rate importance ; but they merit a few observations. 
That man is not the discoverer of any art who first 
says the thing ; but he who first says it so long, and 
so loud, and so clearly, that he compels mankind to 
hear him — the man who is so deeply impressed with 
the importance of the discovery that he will take no 
denial, but at the risk of fortune and fame, pushes 
through all opposition, and is determined that what 
he thinks he has discovered shall not perish for want 
of a fair trial. Other persons had noticed the effect 
of coal gas in producing light ; but Winsor worried 
the town with bad English for three winters before he 
could attract any serious attention to his views. Many 
persons broke stone before Macadam, but Macadam 
felt the discovery more strongly, stated it more clear- 
ly, persevered in it with greater tenacity, wielded his 
hammer, in short, with greater force than other men, 
and finally succeeded in bringing his plan into general 
use. 

Literal translations are not only not used in our 
schools, but are generally discountenanced in them. 
A literal translation, or any translation of a school- 
book, is a contraband article in English schools, which 
a schoolmaster would instantly seize, as a custom- 
house officer would a barrel of gin. Mr. Hamilton, 
on the other hand, maintains, by books and lectures, 
that all boys ought to be allowed to work with literal 
translations, and that it is by far the best method of 
learning a language. If Mr. Hamilton's system is 
just, it is sad trifling to deny his claim to originality, 
by stating that Mr. Locke has said the same thing, 6r 
that others have said the same thing, a century earlier 
than Hamilton. They have all said it so feebly, that 
their observations have passed sub silentio ; and if 
Mr. Hamilton succeeds in being heard and followed, 
to him be the glory — because from him have proceed- 
ed the utility and the advantage. 

The works upon this subject on this plan, published 
before the time of Mr. Hamilton, are Montanus's edi- 
tion of the Bible, with Pignini's interlineary Latin 
version; Lubin's New Testament, having the Greek 
interlined with Latin and German ; Abbe L'Olivet's 
Pensees de Ciceron ; and a French work by the Abbe 
Radon villiers, Paris, 1768 — and Locke upon Educa- 
tion. 

One of the first principles of Mr. Hamilton is, to in- 
troduce very strict literal, interlinear translations, as 
aids to lexicons and dictionaries, and to make so much 
use of them as that the dictionary or lexicon will be 
for a long time little required. We will suppose the 
language to be the Italian, and the book selected to 
be the Gospel of St. John. Of this Gospel Mr. Ham- 
ilton has published a key, of which the following is an 
extract : — 

, , Nel principio era il Verbo e il Verbo era 
In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was 
appresso Dio, e il Verho era Dio. 
near to God, and the Word was God. 
t „ Questro era nel principio appresso Dio. 
This was in the beginning near to God. 
t „ Per mezzo di lui tutte le cose furon fatte : 

By means of him all the things were made : and 
senza di lui nulla fu fatto di cid che e stato 
without of him nothing was made of that, which is been 
fatto. 
tnadt. 



"HAMILTON'S METHOD OF TEACHING LANGUAGES. 



159 



E 



la 



e 

and 



un uomo mandato da Dio che 
a man sent by Ood, who 



nomara 
did name 



luce splende tra le tenebre, 
" And the light shines among the darkness, 
tenebre hanno non ammessa la. 
darkness have not admitted her. 

<6 Vi fu 
There was 
si Giovanni 
himself John. 

<7 Questi venne qual testimone, affin di rendere 
This came like as witness, in order of to render 
testimonianza alia luce, onde per mezzo di lui tutti 
testimony to the light, whence by means of him all 
credessero. 
might believe.' 

In this way Mr. Hamilton contends (and appears to 
us to contend justly), that the language may be ac- 
quired with much greater ease and despatch, than by 
the ancient method of beginning with grammar, — and 
proceeding with the dictionary. We will presume at 
present, that the only object is to read, not to write, 
or speak Italian, and that the pupil instructs himself 
from the key without a master, and is not taught in a 
class. We wish to compare the plan of finding the 
English word in such a literal translation, tc that of 
finding it in dictionaries — and the method of ending 
with grammar, or of taking the grammar at an ad- 
vanced period of knowledge in the language, rather 
than at the beginning. Every one will admit, that of 
all the disgusting labours of life, the labour of lexicon 
and dictionary is the most intolerable. Nor is there a 
greater object of compassion than a fine boy, full of 
animal spirits, set down in a bright sunny day, with 
an heap of unknown words before him, to be turned 
into English, before supper, by the help of a ponder- 
ous dictionary alone. The object in looking into a 
dictionary can only be to exchange an unknown sound 
for one that is known. Now, it seems indisputable, — 
that the sooner this exchange is made the better. The 
greater the number of such exchanges which can be 
made in a given time, the greater is the progress, the 
more abundant the copia verborum obtained by the 
scholar. Would it not be of advantage if the dictio- 
nary at once opened at the required page, and if a 
self-moving index at once pointed to the requisite 
word? Is any advantage gained to the world by the 
time employed first in finding the letter P, and then 
in finding the three guiding letters P R I? This ap- 
pears to us to be pure loss of time, justifiable only if 
it is inevitable ; and even after this is done, what an 
infinite multitude of difficulties are heaped at once 
upon the wretched beginner ! Instead of being reser- 
ved for his greater skill and maturity in the language, 
he must employ himself in discovering in which of 
many senses which his dictionary presents the word 
is to be used ; in considering the case of the substan- 
tive, and the syntaxical arrangement in which it is to 
be placed, and the relation it bears to other words. — 
The loss of time in the merely mechanical part of the 
old plan is immense. We doubt very much, if an av- 
erage boy, between ten and fourteen, will look out or 
find more than sixty words in an hour ; we say noth- 
ing at present of the time employed in thinking of the 
meaning of each word when he has found it, but of 
the mere naked discovery of the word in the lexicon 
or dictionary. It must be remembered, we say an 
average boy— not what Master Evans, the show boy, 
can do, nor what Master Macarthy, the boy who is 
whipt every day, can do, but some boy between Mac- 
arthy and Evans ; and not what this medium boy can 
do, while his mastigophorous superior is frowning 
over him ; but what he actually does, when left in the 
midst of noisy boys, and with a recollection, that, by 
sending to the neighbouring shop, he can obtain any 
quantity of unripe gooseberries upon credit. Now, if 
this statement be true, and if there are 10,000 words 
in the Gospel of St. John, here are 160 hours employ- 
ed in the mere digital process of turning over leaves ! 
But, in much less time than this, any boy of average 
quickness might learn, by the Hamiltonian method, 
to construe the whole four Gospels, with the greatest 
accuracy, and the most scrupulous correctness. The 



' t . In lul era la vita, e la vita era la luce interlineal translation of course spares the trouble and 

In him was the life, and the life was the light time of this mechanical labour. Immediately under 

d *& uomini: the Italian word is placed the English word. The un- 

ofthe^men: __ ... ... , known sound therefore is instantly exchanged tor one 

that is known. The labour here spared is of the most 
irksome nature ; and it is spared at a time of lite the 
most averse to such labour ; and so painful is this la- 
bour to many boys, that it forms an insuperable obsta- 
cle to their progress. They prefer to be flogged, or 
to be sent to sea. It is useless to say of any medicine 
that it is valuable, if it is so nauseous that the patient 
flings it away. You must give me, not the best medi- 
cine you have in your shop, but the best you can get 
me to take. 

We have hitherto been occupied with finding the 
word ; we will now suppose, after running a dirty fin- 
ger down many columns, and after many sighs and 
groans, that the word is found. We presume the 
little fellow working in the true orthodox manner 
without any translation ; he is in pursuit of the Greek 
word BaA>w, and, after a long chase, seizes it as gree- 
dily as a bailiff possesses himself of a fugacious cap- 
tain. But alas ! the vanity of human wishes : — the 
never sufficiently to be pitied stripling has scarcely 
congratulated himself upon his success, when he finds 
Ballo to contain the following meanings in Heder- 
ick's Lexicon : — 1. Jacio ; 2. Jaculor; 3. Ferio ; 4. 
Figo ; 5. Saucio ; 6. Attingo ; 7. Projicio ; 8. Emitto ; 
9. Profundo; 10. Pono ; 11. Immitto ; 12. Trado ;— 
13. Committo; 14. Condo ; 15. iEdifico ; 16. Verso, 
17. Flecto. Suppose the little rogue, not quite at 
home in the Latin tongue, to be desirous of affixing 
English significations to these various words, he has 
then, at the moderate rate of six meanings to every 
Latin word, one hundred and two meanings to the 
word Ballo ; or if he is content with the Latin, he 
has then only seventeen.* 

Words, in their origin, have a natural or primary 
sense. The accidental associations of the people who 
use it, afterwards give to that word a great number oi 
secondary meanings. In some words the primary 
meaning is very common, and the secondary meaning 
very rare. In other instances it is just the reverse ; — 
and in very many the particular secondary meaning is 
pointed out by some preposition which accompanies it, 
or some case by which it is accompanied. But an ac- 
curate translation points these things out gradually as 
it proceeds. The common and most probable mean- 
ings of the word Ballo, or of any other word, are, in 
the Hamiltonian method, insensibly but surely fixed 
on the mind, which, by the lexicon method, must be 
done by a tentative process, frequently ending in gross 
error, noticed with peevishness, punished with sever- 
ity, consuming a great deal of time, and for the most 
part only corrected, after all, by the accurate viva voce 
translation of the master— or, in other words, by the 
Hamiltonian method. 

The recurrence to a translation is treated in our 
schools, as a species of imbecility and meanness ; just 
as if there was any other dignity here than utility, — 
any other object in learning languages, than to turn 
something you do not understand, into something you 
do understand, and as if that was not the best method 
which effected this object in the shortest and simplest 
manner. Hear upon this point the judicious Locke : — 
' But if such a man cannot be got, who speaks good 
Latin, and being able to instruct your son in all these 
parts of knowledge, will undertake it by this method, 
the next best is to have him taught as near this way 
as may be — which is by taking some easy and plea- 
sant book, such as JEsop's Fables, and writing the 



* In addition to the other needless difficulties and miseries 
entailed upon children who are learning languages, their 
Greek Lexicons give a Latin instead of an English transla- 
tion ; and a boy of twelve or thirteen years of age, whose 
attainments in Latin are of course hut moderate, is expected 
to make it the vehicle of knowledge for other languages. 
This is setting the short-sighted and blear-eyed to lead the 
blind ; and is one of those afflicting pieces of absurdity 
which escape animadversion, because they are, and have 
long been, of daily occurrence. Mr. Jones has published an 
English and Greek Lexicon, which we recommend to the 
notice of all persons engaged in education, and not sacra- 
mented against all improvement. 



160 



WORKS OF THE REV. SIDNEY SMITH. 



English translation (made as literal as it can be) in 
one line, and the Latin words which answer each of 
them just over it in another. These let him read every 
day over and over again, till he perfectly understands 
the Latin ; and then go on to another fable, till he be 
also perfect in that, not omitting what he is already 
perfect in, but sometimes reviewing that, to keep it 
in his memory ; and when he comes to write, let these 
be set him for copies, which, with the exercise of his 
hand, will also advance him in Latin. This being a 
more imperfect way than by talking Latin unto him, 
the formation of the verbs first, and afterwards the 
declensions of the nouns and pronouns perfectly learn- 
ed by heart, may facilitate his acquaintance with the 
genius and manner of the Latin tongue, which varies 
the signification of verbs and nouns, not as the modern 
languages do, by particles prefixed, but by changing 
the last syllables. More than this of grammar I think 
he need not have till he can read himself " Sanctii 
Minerva" — with Scioppius and Perigonius's notes.' — 
Locke on Education, p. 74, folio. 

Another recommendation which we have not men- 
tioned in the Hamiltonian system is, that it can be 
combined, and is constantly combined, with the sys- 
tem of Lancaster. The Key is probably sufficient for 
those who have no access to classes and schools : but 
in an Hamiltonian school during the lesson, it is not 
left to the option of the child to trust to the Key 
alone. The master stands in the middle, translates 
accurately and literally the whole verse, and then asks 
the boys the English of separate words, or challenges 
them to join the words together, as he has done. A 
perpetual attention and activity is thus kept up. The 
master, or a scholar (turned into a temporary Lan- 
castrian master), acts as a living lexicon ; and, if 
the thing is well done, as a lively and animating lex- 
icon. How is it possible to compare this with the 
solitary wretchedness of a poor lad of the desk and 
lexicon, suffocated with the nonsense of grammarians, 
overwhelmed with every species of difficulty dispro- 
portioned to his age, and driven by despair to peg top, 
or marbles ? 

1 Taking- these principles as a basis, the teacher forms his 
class of eight, ten, twenty, or one hundred. The number is of 
little moment, it being as easy to teach a greater as a smaller 
one, and brings them at once to the language itself, by reciting-, 
with a loud articulate voice the first verse thus : In in, prin- 
cipio beginning, Verbum Word, erat was, et and, Verbum 
Word, erat was, apud at, Deum God, et and, Verbum Word, 
erat was, Deus God. Having recited the word once or twice 
himself, it is then recited precisely in the same manner by any 
person of the class whom he may deem most capable ; the 
person copying his manner and intonations as much as possible. 
When the verse has been thus recited, by six or eight persons 
of the class, the teacher recites the 2d verse in the same man- 
ner, which is recited as the former by any members of the 
class; and thus continues until he has recited from ten to 
twelve verses, which usually constitute the first lesson of one 
hour. In three lessons, the first Chapter may be thus readily 
translated, the teacher gradually diminishing the number of 
repetitions of the same verse till the fourth lesson, when each 
member of the class translates his verse in turn from the 
mouth of the teacher ; from which period fifty, sixty, or even 
seventy, verses may be translated in the time of a lesson, or one 
hour. At the seventh lesson, it is invariably found that the 
class can translate without the assistance of a teacher farther 
than for occasional correction, and for those words they may 
not have met in the preceding chapters. But, to accomplish 
this, it is absolutely necessary that every member of the class 
know every word of all the preceding lessons ; which, is, how- 
ever, an easy task, the words being always taught him in class, 
and the pupil besides being able to refer to the key whenever 
he is at a loss — the key translated in the very words which the 
teacher has used in the class, from which, as was before re- 
marked, he must never deviate. In ten lessons, it will be found 
that the class can readily translate the whole of the Gospel of 
St. John, which is the first section of the course. Should any 
delay, from any cause, prevent them, it is in my classes always 
for account of teacher, who gives the extra lesson or lessons 
always gratis. It cannot be too deeply impressed on the mind 
of the pupil, that a perfect knowledge of every word of his first 
section is most important to the ease and comfort of his future 
progress. At the end of ten lessons, or first section, the cus- 
tom of my establishments is to give the pupil the Epitome 
Historic Sacra, which is provided with a key in the same 
manner. It was first used in our classes for the first and second 
sections ; we now teach it in one section of ten lessons, which 
we find easier than to teach it in two sections before the pupil 



has read the Testament. When he has read the Epitome, it 
will be then time to give him the theory of the verbs and other 
words which change their terminations. He has already ac- 
quired a good practical knowledge of these things; the theory 
then becomes very easy. A grammar containing the declen- 
sions and conjugations, and printed specially for my classes, is 
then put into the pupil's hands, (not to be got by heart, no- 
thing is ever got by rote on this system,) but that he may com- 
prehend more readily his teacher who lectures on grammar 
generally, but especially on the verbs. From this time, that 
is, from the beginning of the third section, the pupil studies the 
theory and construction of the language as well as its practice. 
For this purpose he reads the ancient authors, beginning with 
Caesar, which, together with the Selecta e Profanis, fills use 
fully the third and fourth sections. When these with the pro- 
ceding books are well known, the pupil will find little diffi- 
culty in reading the authors usually read in schools. The 
fifth and sixth sections consist of Virgil and Horace, enough of 
which is read to enable the pupil to read them with facility, 
and to give him correct ideas of Prosody and Versification. 
Five or six months, with mutual attention on the part of the 
pupil and teacher, will be found sufficient to acquire a know- 
ledge of this language, which hitherto has rarely been tha 
result of as many years.' 

We have before said, that the Hamiltonian system 
must not depend upon Mr. Hamilton's method of car- 
rying it into execution ; for instance, he banishes from 
schools the effects of emulation. The boys do not 
take each other's places. This, we think, is a sad ab- 
surdity. A cook might as well resolve to make bread 
without fermentation, as a pedagogue to carry on a 
school without emulation. It must be a sad doughy 
lump without this vivifying principle. Why are boys 
to be shut out from a class of feelings to which society 
owes so much, and upon which their conduct in fu- 
ture life must (if they are worth anything) be so close- 
ly constructed ? Poet A writes verses to outshine 
poet B. Philosopher C sets up roasting Titanium, and 
boiling Chromium, that he may be thought more of 
than philosopher D. Mr. Jackson strives to out-paint 
Sir Thomas; Sir Thomas Lethbridge to overspeak 
Mr. Canning ; and so society gains good chemists, 
poets, painters, speakers, and orators ; and why are 
not boys to be emulous as well as men ? 

If a boy were in Paris, would he learn the language 
better by shutting himself up to read French books 
with a dictionary, or by conversing freely with all 
whom he met ? and what is conversation but an 
Hamiltonian school ? Every man you meet is a living 
lexicon and grammar — who is perpetually instructing 
you, in spite of yourself, in the terminations of French 
substantives and verbs. The analogy is still closer, 
if you converse with persons of whom you can ask 
questions, and who will be at the trouble of correcting 
you. What madness would it be to run away from 
these pleasing facilities, as too dangerously easy — to 
stop your ears, to double-lock the door, and to look 
out chickens ; taking a walk ; and fine weather ; in 
Boyer's Dictionary — and then, by the help of Cham- 
baud's Grammar, to construct a sentence which should 
signify, ' Come to my house, and eat some chickens, if it 
is fine?' But there is in England almost a love of 
difficulty and needless labour. We are so resolute 
and industrious in raising up impediments which 
ought to be overcome, that there is a sort of suspicion 
against the removal of these impediments, and a no- 
tion that the advantage is not fairly come by without 
the previous toil. If the English were in a paradise of 
spontaneous productions, they would continue to dig 
and plough, though they were never a peach nor a 
pine-apple the better for it. 

A principal point to attend to in the Hamiltonian 
system, is the prodigious number of words and phras- 
es which pass through the boy's mind, compared with 
those which are presented to him by the old plan. As 
a talkative boy learns French sooner in France than a 
silent boy, so a translator of books learns sooner to 
construe, the more he translates. An Hamiltonian 
makes, in six or seven lessons, three or four hundred 
times as many exchanges of English for French or 
Latin, as a grammar schoolboy can do ; and if he 
loses 50 per cent, of all he hears, his progress is still, 
beyond all possibility of comparison, more rapid. 

As for pronunciation of living languages, we see no 
reason why that consideration should be introduced in 



HAMILTON'S METHOD OF TEACHING LANGUAGES. 



161 



this place. We are decidedly of opinion, that all liv- 
ing languages are best learnt in the country where they 
are spoken, or by living with those who come from 
that country ; but if that cannot be, Mr. Hamilton's 
method is better than the grammar and dictionary 
method. Cceteris paribus, Mr. Hamilton's method, as 
far as French is concerned, would be better in the 
hands of a Frenchman, and his Italian method in the 
hands of an Italian ; but all this has nothing to do 
with the system. 

1 Have I read through Lilly ? — have I learnt by 
heart that most atrocious monument of absurdity, the 
Westminster Grammar ? — have I been whipt for the 
.substantives ? — whipt for the verbs ? — and whipt for 
and with the interjections? — have I picked the sense 
slowly, and word by word, out of Hederick? — and 
shall my eon Daniel be exempt from all this misery ? 
—Shall a little unknown person in Cecil Street, Strand, 
No. 25, pretend to tell me that all this is unnecessary? 
— Was it. possible that I might have been spared all 
this? — The whole system is nonsense, and the man 
an impostor. If there had been any truth in it, it 
must have occurred to some one else before this peri- 
od.'— This is a very common style of observation upon 
Mr. Hamilton's system, and by no means an uncom- 
mon wish of the mouldering and decaying part of man- 
kind, that the next generation should not enjoy any 
advantages from which they themselves have been 
precluded. — < Ay, ay, it's all mighty well — but I went 
through tkii ?nyself, and I am determined my children 
shall do the htpteJ We are convinced that a great deal 
of opposition to improvement proceeds from this prin- 
ciple. Crabbe might make a good picture of an unbe- 
ftevolent old man, slowly retiring from this sublunary 
scene, and lamenting that the coming race of men 
would be less bumped on the roads, better lighted in 
the streets, and less tormented with grammars and 
lexicons, than in the preceding age. A great deal of 
compliment to the wisdom of ancestors, and a great 
degree of alarm at the dreadful spirit of innovation, 
are soluble into mere jealousy and envy. 

But what is to become of a boy who has no difficul- 
ties to grapple with ? How enervated will that under- 
standing be, to which everything is made so clear, 
plain, and easy ; — no hills to walk up, no chasms to 
step over ; every thing graduated, soft, and smooth. 
All this, however, is an objection to the multiplication 
table, to Napier's bones, and to every invention for 
the abridgment of human labour. There is no dread 
of any lack of difficulties. Abridge intellectual labour 
by any process you please — multiply mechanical 
powers to any extent — there will be sufficient, and in- 
finitely more than sufficient, of laborious occupation 
for the mind and body of man. Why is the boy to be 
idle ?— By and by comes the book without a key ; by 
and by comes the lexicon. They do come at last — 
though at a better period. But if they did not come — 
if they were useless, if language could be attained 
without them — would any human being wish to retain 
difficulties for their own sake, which led to nothing 
useful, and by the annihilation of which our faculties 
were left to be exercised, by difficulties which do lead 
to something useful — by mathematics, natural philos- 
ophy, and every branch of useful knowledge ? Can 
any one be so anserous as to suppose, that the facul- 
ties of young men cannot be exercised, and their in- 
dustry and activity called into proper action, because 
Mr. Hamilton teaches, in three or four years, what 
has (in a more vicious system) demanded seven or 
eight ? Besides, even in the Hamiltonian method it is 
very easy for one boy to outstrip another. Why may 
not a clever and ambitious boy employ three hours 
upon his key by himself, while another boy has only 
employed one ? There is plenty of corn to thrash, 
and of chaff to be winnowed away, in Mr. Hamilton's 
system ; the difference is, that every blow tells, be- 
cause it is properly; directed. In the old way, half 
their force Avas lost "in air. There is a" mighty foolish 
apophthegm of Dr. Bell?s,* that it is not what is done 
for a boy that is of importance, but what a boy does 

* A very foolish old gentleman, seized on eagerly by the 
Church of England to defraud Lancaster of his discovery. 

L 



for himself. This is just as wise as to say, that it is 
not the breeches which are made for a boy that can co- 
ver his nakedness, but* the breeches he makes for him- 
self. All this entirely depends upon a comparison of 
the time saved, by showing the boy how to do a thing, 
rather than by leaving him to do it himself. Let the 
object be. for example, a pair of shoes. The boy will 
effect this object much better if you show him how to 
make the shoes, than if you merely give him wax, 
thread, and leather, and leave him to find out all the 
ingenious abridgements of labour which have been dis- 
covered by experience. The object is to turn Latin 
into English. The scholar will do it much better and 
sooner if the word is found for him, than if he finds it 
—much better and sooner if you point out the effect of 
the terminations, and the nature of the syntax, than if 
you leave him to detect them for himself. The thing 
is at last done by the pupil himself — for he reads the 
language — which was the thing to be done. All the 
help he has received has only enabled him to make a 
more economical use of his time, and to gain his end 
sooner. Never be afraid of wanting difficulties for 
your pupil; if means are rendered more easy, more 
will be expected. The animal will be compelled, or 
induced to all that he can do. Macadam has made 
the roads better. Dr. Bell would have predicted, that 
the horses would get too fat ; but the actual result is, 
that they are compelled to go ten miles an hour in- 
stead of eight. 

1 For teaching children, this, too, I think is to be 
observed, that, in most cases, where they stick, they 
are not to be farther puzzled, by putting them upon 
finding it out themselves ; as by asking such questions 
as these, viz. — which is the nominative case in the 
sentence they are to construe ? or demanding what 
<•' aufero" signifies, to lead them to the knowledge 
what " abstulere"' signifies, &c, when they cannot 
readily tell. This wastes time only in disturbing 
them. ; for whilst they are learning, and apply them- 
selves with attention, they are to be kept in good hu- 
mour, and every thing made easy to them, and as 
pleasant as possible. Therefore, wherever they are 
at a stand, and are willing to go forwards, help them 
presently over the difficulty, without any rebuke or 
chiding ; remembering that, where harsher ways are 
taken, they are the effect only of pride and peevish- 
ness in the teacher, who expects children should in- 
stantly be masters of as much as he knows ; whereas 
he should rather consider, that his business is to set- 
tle in them habits, not angrily to inculcate rules.'' — 
Locke on Education, p. 74. 

Suppose the first five books of Herodotus to be ac- 
quired by a key, or literal translation after the meth- 
od of Hamilton, so that the pupil could construe them 
with the greatest accuracy ; — we do not pretend, be- 
cause the pupil could construe this book, that he 
could construe any other book equally easy ; we mere- 
ly say, that the pupil has acquired, by these means, 
a certain copia verborum, and a certain practical 
knowledge of grammar, which must materially dimi- 
nish the difficulty of reading the next book ; that his 
difficulties diminish in a compound ratio with every 
fresh book he reads with a key — till at last he reads 
any common book, without a key — and that he at- 
tains his last point of perfection in a time incompara- 
bly less, and with difficulties incomparably smaller, 
than in the old method. 

There are a certain number of French books, which 
when a boy can construe accurately, he may be said, 
for all purposes of reading, to be master of the French 
language. No matter how he has attained this power 
of construing the books. If you try him thoroughly, 
and are persuaded he is perfectly master of the books 
— then he possesses the power in question — he under- 
stands the language. Let these books, for the sake 
of the question, be Telemachus, the History of Louis 
XIV., the Henriade, the Plays of Racine, and the Re- 
volutions of Vertot. We would have Hamiltonian keys 
to all these books, and the Lancasterian method of 
instruction. We believe these books would be mas- 
tered in one-sixth part of the time, by these means, 
that they would be by the old method of looking out 
the words in the dictionary, and then coming to say 



WORKS OF THE REV. SIDNEY SMITH. 



the lesson to the master ; and we believe that the boys, 
long before they came to the end of this series of books, 
■would be able to do without their keys — to fling away 
their cork-jackets, and to swim alone. But boys who 
learn a language in four or five months, it is said, are 
apt to forget it again. Why, then, does not a young 
person, who has been five or six months in Paris, for- 
get his French four or five years afterwards ? It has 
been obtained without any of that labour, which the 
objectors to the Hamiltonian system deem to be so 
essential to memory. It has been obtained in the 
midst of tea and bread and butter, and yet is in a great 
measure retained for a whole life. In the same man- 
ner, the pupils of this new school use a colloquial liv- 
ing dictionary, and, from every principle of youthful 
emulation, contend with each other in catching the in- 
terpretation, and in applying to the lesson before 
them. 

' If you wish boys to remember any language, make 
the acquisition of it very tedious and disgusting.' 
This seems to be an odd rule : but if it is good for 
language, it must be good also for every species of 
knowledge — music, mathematics, navigation, architec- 
ture. In all these sciences aversion should be the pa- 
rent of memory — impediment the cause of perfection. 
If difficulty is the cause of memory, the boy who 
learns with the greatest difficulty will remember with 
the greatest tenacity ; — in other words, the acquisi- 
tions of a dunce will be greater and- more important 
than those of a clever boy. Where is the love of diffi- 
culty going to end ? Why not leave a boy to compose 
his own dictionary and grammar ? It is not what is 
done for a boy, but what he does for himself, that is 
of any importance. Are there difficulties enough in 
the old method of acquiring languages ? Would it be 
better if the difficulties were doubled, and thirty years 
given to languages, instead of fifteen ? All these ar- 
guments presume the difficulty to be got over, and 
then the memory to be improved. But what if the 
difficulty is shrunk from? What if it puts an end to 
power, instead of increasing it ; and extinguishes, in- 
stead of exciting, application? And when these ef- 
fects are produced, you not only preclude all hopes 
of learning, or language, but you put an end for ever 
to all literary habits, and to all improvements from 
study. The boy who is lexicon-struck in early youth 
looks upon all books afterwards with horror, and goes 
over to the blockheads. Every boy would be pleased 
with books, and pleased with school, and be glad to 
forward the views of his parents, and obtain the 
praise of his master, if he found it possible to make 
tolerable easy progress ; but he is driven to absolute 
despair by gerunds, and wishes himself dead ! Pro- 
gress is pleasure — activity is pleasure. It is impossi- 
ble for a boy not to make progress, and not to be ac- 
tive in the Hamiltonian method; and this pleasing 
state of mind we contend to be more favourable to me- 
mory, than the languid jaded spirit which much com- 
merce Avith lexicons never fails to produce. 

Translations are objected to in schools justly en- 
ough, when they are paraphrases and not translations. 
It is impossible, from a paraphrase or very loose trans- 
lation, to make any useful progress — they retard ra- 
ther than accelerate a knowledge of the language to be 
acquired, and are the principal causes of the discredit 
into which translations have been brought, as instru- 
ments of education. 

Infandum Regina jubes renovare dolorem, 
Regina, jubes renovare dolorem infandum. 
Oh ! Queen, thou orderest to renew grief not to be spokenof. 
1 Oh ! Queen, in pursuance of your commands, I enter 
upon the narrative of misfortunes almost too great for ut- 
terance. 

The first of these translations leads us directly to 
the explication of a foreign language, as the latter in- 
sures a perfect ignorance of it. 

It is difficult enough to introduce any useful novelty 
in education without enhancing its perils by needless 
and untenable paradox. Mr. Hamilton has made an 
assertion in his Preface to the Key of the Italian Gos- 
pel, which has no kind of foundation in fact, and which 



has afforded a conspicuous mark for the aim of his an* 
tagonists. 

< I have said that each word is translated by its one sole 
undeviating meaning, assuming as an incontrovertible prin- 
ciple in all languages that, with very few exceptions, each 
word has one meaning only, and can usually be rendered 
correctly into another by one word only, which one worr 1 
should serve for its representative at all times and on all oc 
casions.' 

Now, it is probable that each word had one mean- 
ing only in its origin ; but metaphor and association 
are so busy with human speech, that the same word 
comes to serve in a vast variety of senses, and contin- 
ues to do so long after the metaphors and associations 
which called it into this state of activity are buried 
in oblivion. Why may not jubeo be translated order 
as well as command, or dolorem rendered grief as Avell 
as sorrow ? Mr. Hamilton has expressed himself 
loosely ; but he perhaps means no more than to say, 
that in school translations, the metaphysical, meaning 
should never be adopted, when the word can be ren- 
dered by its primary signification. We shall allow 
him, however, to detail his own method of making the 
translation in question. 

'* Translations on the Hamiltonian system, according to 
which this book is translated, must not be confounded with 
translations made according to Locke, Clarke, Sterling, or 
even according to Dumarsais, Fremont, and a number of 
other Frenchmen, who have made what have been and ane 
yet sometimes called literal, and interlineal translations. 
The latter are, indeed, interlineal, but no literal translation 
had ever appeared in any language before those called Ha- 
miltonian, that is, before my "Gospel of St. John from the 
French, the Greek, and Latin Gospels, published in Lon- 
don, and L'Hommond's Epitome of the Historia Sacra. 
These and these only were and are truly literal ; that is to 
say, that every word is rendered in English by a correspond- 
ing part of speech; that the grammatical analysis of the 
phrase is never departed from ; and the mood, tense, and 
person of every verb, are accurately pointed out by appro- 
priate and unchanging signs, so that a grammarian not un- 
derstanding one word of Italian, would, on reading any 
part of the translation here given, be instantly able to parse 
it. In the translations above alluded to, an attempt is made 
to preserve the correctness of the language into which the 
different works are translated, but the wish to conciliate this 
correctness with a literal translation, has only produced a 
barbarous and uncouth idiom, while it has in every case de- 
ceived the unlearned pupil by a translation altogether false 
and incorrect. Such translations may, indeed, give an idea 
of what is contained in the book translated, but they will 
not assist, or at least very little, in enabling the pupil to 
make out the exact meaning of each word, which is 
the principal object of Hamiltonian translations. The 
reader will understand this better by an illustration : A 
gentleman has lately given a translation of Juvenal accord- 
ing to the plan of the above-mentioned authors, beginning 
with the words semper ego, which he joins and translates, 
" shall I always be" — if his intention were to teach Latin 
words, he might as well have said, " shall I always eat beef- 
steaks ?" — True, there is nothing about beef-steaks ih sem- 
per e»o, but neither is there about " shall be:" the whole 
translation is on the same plan, that is to say, that there is 
not one line of it correct, I had almost said" one word, on 
which the pupil can rely, as the exact equivalent in English 
of the Latin word above it. — Not so the translation here 
given. 

' As the object of the author has been that the pupil should 
know every word as well as he knows it himself, he has uni- 
formly given it the one sole, precise meaning which it has in 
our language, sacrificing everywhere the beauty, the idiom, 
and the correctness of the English language to the original, in 
order to show the perfect idiom, phraseology, and picture of 
that original as in a glass. So far is this carried, that where 
the English language can express the precise meaning of the 
Italian phrase only by a barbarism, this barharism is employed 
without scruple — as thus ; " e le tenebre non l'hanno ammessa." 
—Here the word tenebre being plural, if you translate it dark- 
ness, you not only give a false translation of the word itself, 
which is used by the Italians in the plural number, but what is 
much more important, you lead the pupil into an error about 
its government, it being the nominative case to hanno, which 
is the third person plural ; it is therefore translated not dark- 
ness, but darknesses.' 

To make these keys perfect, we rather think there 
should be a free translation added to the literal one. 
Not a paraphrase, but only so free as to avoid any 
awkward or barbarous expression. The comparison 



HAMILTON'S METHOD OF TEACHING LANGUAGES. 



103 



between the free and the literal translation would im- 
mediately show to young people the peculiarities of 
the language in which they were engaged. 

Literal translation or key — Oh ! Queen, thou orderest 
me to renew grief not to be spoken of. 

Free — ' Oh ! Queen, thou orderest me to renew my 
grief, too great lor utterance.' 

The want of this accompanying free translation is 
not felt in keys of the Scriptures, because, in fact, the 
English Bible is a free translation, great part of which 
the scholar remembers. But in a work entirely un- 
known, of which a key was given, as full of awkward 
and barbarous expressions as a key certainly ought to 
be, a scholar might be sometimes puzzled to arrive at 
the real sense. We say as full of awkward and bar- 
barous expressions as it ought to be, because we 
thoroughly approve of Mr. Hamilton's plan, of always 
sacrificing English and elegance to sense, when they 
cannot be united in the key. We are rather sorry Mr. 
Hamilton's first essay has been in a translation of the 
Scriptures, because every child is so familiar with 
them, that it may be difficult to determine whether 
the apparent progress is ancient recollection or recent 
attainment ; and because the Scriptures are so full of 
Hebraisms and Syriacisms, and the language so differ- 
ent from that of Greek authors, that it does not secure 
a knowledge of the language equivalent to the time 
employed upon it. 

The keys hitherto published by Mr. Hamilton are 
the Greek, Latin, French, Italian, and German keys 
to the Gospel of St. John, Perrin's Fables, Latin His- 
toria Sacra, Latin, French, and Italian Grammar, and 
Studia Metrica. One of the difficulties under which 
the system is labouring, is a want of more keys. 
Some of the best Greek and Roman classics should be 
immediately published, with keys, and by very good 
scholars. We shall now lay before our readers an 
extract from one of the public papers respecting the 
progress made in the Hamiltonian schools. 

* Extract from the Morning Chronicle of Wednesday, No- 
vember 16th, 1825. — Hamiltonian System. — We yesterday were 
present at an examination of eight lads who have been under 
Mr. Hamilton since some time in the month of May last, with' a 
view to ascertain the efficacy of his system in communicating 
a knowledge of languages. These eight lads, all of them be- 
tween the ages of twelve and fourteen, are the children of poor 
people, who, when they were first placed under Mr. Hamilton, 
possessed no other instruction than common reading and wri- 
ting. They were obtained from a common country school, 
through the interposition of a member of Parliament, who 
takes an active part in promoting charity schools throughout 
the country; and the choice was determined by the consent of 
the parents, and not by the cleverness of the boys. 

' They have been employed in learning Latin, French, and 
latterly Italian ; and yesterday they were examined by several 
distinguished individuals, among whom we recognized John 
Smith, Esq. M. P. ; G. Smith, Esq. M. P. ; Mr. J. Mill, the his- 
torian of British India; Major Camac; Major Thompson ; Mr. 
Cowell, &c. <fec. They first read different portions of the Gos- 
pel of St. John in Latin, and of Caesar's Commentaries, select- 
ed by the visitors. The translation was executed with an ease 
which it would be in vain to expect in any of the boys who at- 
tend our common schools, even in their third or fourth year ; 
and proved, that the principle of exciting the attention of boys 
to the utmost, during the process by which the meaning of the 
words is fixed in their memory, had given them a great famil- 
iarity with so much of the language as is contained in the 
books above alluded to. Their knowledge of the parts of 
speech was respectable, but not so remarkable ; as the Hamil- 
tonian system follows the natural mode of acquiring language, 
and only employs the boys in analyzing, when they have al- 
ready attained a certain familiarity with any language. 

' The same experiments were repeated in French and Italian 
with the same success, and, upon the whole, we cannot but 
think the success has been complete. It is impossible to con- 
ceive a more impartial mode of putting any system to the test, 
than to make such an experiment on the children of our peas- 
antry.' 

Into the truth of this statement we have personally 
inquired, and it seems to us to have fallen short of the 
facts, from the laudable fear of overstating them. 
The lads selected for the experiment were parish boys 
of the most ordinary description, reading English 
worse than Cumberland curates, and totally ignorant 
of the rudiments of any other language. They were 
purposely selected for the experiment by a gentleman 
who defrayed its expense, and who had the strongest 



desire to put strictly to the test the efficacy of the 
Hamiltonian system. The experiment was begun the 
middle of May, 1825, and concluded on the day of 
November in the same year mentioned in the extract, 
exactly six months after. The Latin books set before 
them were the Gospel of St. John, and parts of Ceesar's 
Commentaries. Some Italian book or books (what 
we know not), and a selection of French histories. 
The visitors put the boys on where they pleased, and 
the translation was (as the reporter says) executed 
with an ease which it would be vain to expect in any 
of the boys who attend our common schools, even in 
their third or fourth year.* 

From experiments and observations which have 
fallen under our own notice, we do not scruple to make 
the following assertions. If there were keys to the 
four Gospels, as there is to that of St. John, any boy 
or girl of thirteen years of age, and of moderate capa"- 
city ; studying four hours a day, and beginning with an 
utter ignorance even of the Greek character, would 
learn to construe the four Gospels with the most per- 
fect and scrupulous accuracy, in six weeks. Some 
children, utterly ignorant of French or Italian, would 
learn to construe the four Gospels, in either of these 
languages, in three weeks ; the Latin in four weeks ; 
the German in five weeks. We believe they would do 
it in a class , but not to run any risks, we will pre- 
sume a master to attend upon one student alone for 
these periods. We assign a master principally, be 
cause the application of a solitary boy at that age 
could not be depended upon ; but if the sedulity of the 
child were certain, he would do it nearly as well aione. 
A greater time is allowed for German and Greek, on 
account of the novelty of the character. A person of 
mature habits, eager and energetic in his pursuits, and 
reading seven or eight hours per day, might, though 
utterly ignorant of a letter of Greek, learn to construe 
the four Gospels, with the most punctilious accuracy 
in three weeks, by the key alone. These assertions 
we make, not of the Gospels alone, but of any toler- 
ably easy book of the same extent. We mean to be 
very accurate ; but suppose we are wrong — add 10, 20, 
30 per cent, to the time, an average boy of thirteen, in 
an average school, cannot construe the four Gospels 
in two years from the time of his beginning the lan- 
guage. 

All persons would be glad to read a foreign lan- 
guage, but all persons do nol want the same scrupulous 
and comprehensive knowledge of grammar which a 
great Latin scholar possesses. Many persons may, 
and do, derive great pleasure and instruction from 
French, German, and Italian books, who can neither 
speak nor write these languages — who know that cer- 
tain terminations when they see them, signify present 
or past time, but who, if they wished to signify pre- 
sent or past time, could not recall these terminations. 
For many purposes and objects, therefore, very little 
grammar is wanting. 

The Hamiltonian method begins with what all per- 
sons want, a facility of construing, and leaves every 
scholar to become afterwards as profound in grammar 
as he (or those who educate him) may choose ; 
whereas the old method aims at making all more pro- 
found grammarians than three-fourths wish to be, or 
than nineteen-twentieths can be. One of the enor- 
mous follies of the enormously foolish education in 
England, is, that all young men — dukes, fox-hunters, 
and merchants — are educated as if they were to keep 
a school, and serve a curacy ; while scarcely an hour 
in the Hamiltonian education is lost for any variety of 
life. A grocer may learn enough of Latin to taste the 
sweets of Virgil ; a cavalry officer may read and un- 
derstand Homer, without knowing that fyp comes 
from eo) with a smooth breathing, and that it is formed 
by an improper reduplication. In the mean time, 
there is nothing in that education which prevents a 
scholar from knowing (if he wishes to know) what 

* We have left with the bookseller the names of two gentle- 
men who have verified this account to us, and who were pres- 
ent at the experiment. Their names will at once put an end 
to all scepticism as to the fact. Two more candid and enlight- 
ened judges could not be found. 



164 



WORKS OF THE REV. SIDNEY SMITH. 



Geeek compounds draw back their accents. He may 
trace verbs in Ipt from polysyllables in < w , or derive 
endless glory from marking down derivatives in nrw, 
changing the e of their primitives into iota. 

Thus in the Hamiltonian method, a good deal of 
grammar necessarily impresses itself upon the mind 
(chemin faisant) , as it does in the vernacular tongue, 
without any rule at all, and merely by habit. How is 
it possible to read many Latin keys, for instance, 
without remarking, willingly or unwillingly, that the 
iirst persons of verbs end hi o, the second in s, the 
third in t? — that the same adjective ends in us or a, 
accordingly as the connected substantive is masculine 
or feminine, and other such gross and common rules ? 
An Englishman who means to say, I will go to London, 
does not say, I could go to London. He never read 
a word of grammar in his life ; but he has learnt, by 
habit, that the word go, signifies to proceed or set 
forth, and by the same habit he learns that future in- 
tentions are expressed by I vAll ; and by the same 
habit the Hamiltonian pupil, reading over, and com- 
prehending twenty times more words and phrases than 
the pupil of the ancient system, insensible but infalli- 
bly fixes upon his mind many rules of grammar. We 
are far from meaning to say, that the grammar thus 
acquired will be sufficiently accurate for the first-rate 
Latin and Greek scholar ; but there is no reason why 
a young person arriving at this distinction, and educa- 
ted in the Hamiltonian system, may not carry the 
study of grammar to any degree of minuteness and 
accuracy. The only difference is, that he begins 
grammar as a study, after he has made a considera- 
ble progress in the language, and not before — a very 
important feature in the Hamiltonian system, and a 
very £reat improvement in the education of children. 

rhfl imperfections of the old system proceed in a 
great measure from a bad and improvident accumu- 
lation of difficulties, which must all, perhaps, though 
in a less degree, at one time or another be encounter- 
ed, but which may be, and in the Hamiltonian system 
are, much more wisely distributed. A boy who sits 
down to Greek with lexicon and grammar, has to mas- 
ter an unknown language — to look out words in a lexi- 
con, in the use of which he is inexpert — to guess, by 
many trials, in which of the numerous senses detailed 
in the lexicon he is to use the word — to attend to the 
inflections of cases and tense — to become acquainted 
with the syntax of the language — and to become ac- 
quainted with these inflexions and this syntax from 
books written in foreign languages, and full of the 
most absurd and barbarous terms, and this at the ten- 
derest age, when the mind is utterly unfit to grapple 
with any great difficulty ; and the boy, who revolts at 
all this folly and absurdity, is set down for a dunce, 
and must go into a marching regiment, or on board a 
man of war • The Hamiltonian pupil has his word 
looked out for him, its proper sense ascertained, the 
case of the substantive, the inflexions of the verb 
pointed out, and the syntaxical arrangement placed 
before his eyes. Where, then, is he to encounter 
these difficulties ? Does he hope to escape them en- 
tirely ? Certainly not, if it is his purpose to become 
a great scholar ; but he will enter upon them when 
the character is familiar to his eye — when a great 
number of Greek words are familiar to his eye and 
ear — when he has practically mastered a great deal 
of grammar — when the terminations of verbs convey 
to him different modifications of time, the termina- 
tions of substantives different varieties of circumstance 
— when the rules of grammar, in short, are a confirma- 
tion of previous observation, not an irksome multitude 
of directions, heaped up without any opportunity of 
immediate application. 

The real way of learning a dead language, is to 
imitate, as much as possible, the method in which a 
living language is naturally learnt. When do we ever 
find a well educated Englishman or Frenchman em- 
barrassed by an ignorance of the grammar of their 
respective languages ? They first learn it practically 
and unerringly ; and then, if they choose and look 
back and smile at the idea of having proceeded by a 
number of rules without knowing one of them by heart, 
« being conscious that they had any rule at all, this 



is a philosophical amusement : but whoever thinks o* 
learning the grammar of their own tongue before they 
are very good grammarians ? Let us hear what Mr. 
Locke says upon this subject : — ' If grammar ought 
to be taught at any time, it must be to one that can 
speak the language already ; how else can he be taught 
the grammar of it ? This at least is evident, from the 
practice of the wise and learned nations amongst the 
ancients. They made it a part of education to culti- 
vate their own, not foreign languages. The Greeks 
counted all other nations barbarous, and had a con- 
tempt for their languages. And though the Greek 
learning grew in credit amongst the Romans towards 
the end of their commonwealth, yet it was the Roman 
tongue that was made the study of their youth : their 
own language they were to make use of, and therefore 
it was their own language they were instructed and 
exercised in. 

' But, more particularly, to determine the proper 
season for grammar, I do not see how it can reasona- 
bly be made any one's study, but as an introduction 
to rhetoric. When it is thought time to put any one 
upon the care of polishing his tongue, and of speaking 
better than the illiterate, then is the time for him to 
be instructed in the rules of grammar, and not before. 
For grammar being to teach men not'to speak, but to 
speak correctty, and according to the exact rules of 
the tongue, which is one part of elegancy, there is 
little use of the one to him that has no need of the 
other. Where rhetoric is not necessary, grammar 
may be spared. I know hot why any one should 
waste his time, and beat his head about the Latin 
grammar, who does not intend to be a critic, or make 
speeches, and write despatches in it. When any one 
finds in himself a necessity or disposition to study any 
foreign language to the bottom, and to be nicely exact 
in the knowledge of it, it will be time enough to take 
a grammatical survey of it. If his use of it be only 
to understand some books writ in it, without a critical 
knowledge of the tongue itself, reading alone, as I 
have said, will attain that end, without charging the 
mind with the multiplied rules and intricacies of gram- 
mar.' — Locke on Education, p. 78, folio. 

In the Eton Grammar, the following very plain and 
elementary information is conveyed to young gentle- 
men utterly ignorant of every syllable of the lan- 
guage : — 

1 Nomina anomala quae contrahuntur sunt, ''OXoiraOrj, quae 
contrahuntur in omnibus, ut yoos yovs, Sec. 'O\iyonadfj, quae 
in paucioribus casibus contrahuntur, ut substantiva Barytonia 
in vp. Imparyllatriain ovp,' &c. &c. 

From the Westminster Grammar we make the fol- 
lowing extract — and some thousand rules, conveyed 
in poetry of equal merit, must be fixed upon the mind 
of the youthful Grecian, before he advances into the 
interior of the language. 

• w finis thematis finis utriusque futuri est 
Post liquidam in primo, vel in unoquoque secundo, 
o> circumflexum est. Ante w finale character 
Explicitus os primi est implicitusque futuri 
to itaque in quo c quasi plexum est solitu in ffw.' 

Westminster Greek Grammar, 1814. 

Such are the easy initiations of our present methods 
of teaching. The Hamiltonian system, on the other 
hand, 1. teaches an unknown tongue by the closest in- 
terlinear translation, instead of leaving a boy to ex- 
plore his way by the lexicon or dictionary. 2. It 
postpones the study of grammar till a considerable 
progress has been made in the language, and a great 
degree of practical grammar has been acquired. 3. It 
substitutes the cheerfulness and competition of the 
Lancasterian system for the dull solitude of the dic- 
tionary. By these means, a boy finds he is making a 
progress, and learning something from the very be- 
ginning. He is not overwhelmed with the first ap- 
pearance of insuperable difficulties ; he receives some 
little pay from the first moment of his apprenticeship, 
and is not compelled to wait for remuneration till he 
is out of his time. The student having acquired the 
great art of understanding the sense of what is written 
in another tongue, may go into the study of the Ian. 



COUNSEL FOR PRISONERS. 



165 



guage as deeply and as extensively as he pleases. 
The old system aims at beginning with a depth and 
accuracy which many men never will want, which 
disgusts many from arriving even at moderate attain- 
ments, and is a less easy, and not more certain road 
to a profound skill in languages, than if attention to 
grammar had been deferred to a later period. 

In fine, we are strongly persuaded, that the time 
being given, this system will make better scholars ; 
and the degree of scholarship being given, a much 
shorter time will be needed. If there is any truth in 
this, it will make Mr. Hamilton one of the most use- 
ful men of his age ; for if there is any thing which fills 
reflecting men with melancholy and regret, it is the 
waste of mortal time, parental money, and puerile 
happiness, in the present method of pursuing Latin 
and Greek. 



COUNSEL FOR PRISONERS. (Edinburgh Re- 
view, 1826.) 

Stockton on the Practice of not allotting Counsel for Prison- 
ers accused of Felony. 8vo. London, 182C. 

On the sixth of April, 1824, Mr. George Lamb, (a 
gentleman who is always the advocate of whatever is 
honest and liberal), presented the following petition 
from several jurymen in the habit of serving on juries 
at the Old Bailey :— 

* That your petitioners, fully sensible of the invaluable 
privilege of jury trials, and desirous of seeing them as com- 
plete as human institutions will admit, feel it their duty to 
draw the attention of the House to the restrictions imposed 
on the prisoner's counsel, which, they humbly conceive, 
have strong claims to legislative remedy. With every dis- 
position to/iecide justly, the petitioners have found, by ex- 
perience, in the course of their attendance as jurymen in 
the old Bailey, that the opening statements for the prosecu- 
tion too frequently leave an impression more unfavourable 
to the prisoner at the bar, than the evidence of itself could 
have produced ; and it has always sounded harsh to the pe- 
titioners to hear it announced from the bench, that the 
counsel, to whom the prisoner has committed his defence, 
cannot be permitted to address the jury in his behalf nor 
reply to the charges which have, or have not, been substan- 
tiated by the witnesses. The petitioners have felt their sit- 
uation peculiarly painful and embarrassing when the pri- 
soner's faculties, perhaps surprised by such an intimation, 
are too much absorbed in the difficulties of his unhappy cir- 
cumstances to admit of an eifort towards his own justifica- 
tion, against the statements of the prosecutor's counsel, 
often unintentionally aggravated through zeal or miscon- 
ception ; and it is purely with a view to the attainment of 
impartial justice, that the petitioners humbly submit to the 
serious consideration of the House the expediency of allow- 
ing every accused person the full benefit of counsel, as in 
cases of misdemeanour, and according to the practice of 
the civil courts.' 

With the opinions so sensibly and properly expres- 
sed by these jurymen, we most cordially agree. We 
have before touched incidentally on this subject; but 
shall now give to it a more direct, and a fuller exami- 
nation. We look upon it as a very great blot in our 
over-praised criminal code ; and no efibrt of ours shall 
be wanting, from time to time, for its removal. 

We have now the benefit of discussing these sub- 
jects under the government of a home secretary of 
state, whom we may (we believe) fairly call a wise, 
honest, and high principled man — as he appears to us, 
without wishing for innovation, or having any itch for 
it, not to be afraid of innovation,* when it is gradual 
and well considered. He is, indeed, almost the only 
person we remember in his station, who has not con- 
sidered sound sense to consist in the rejection of every 
improvement, and loyalty to be proved by the defence 
of every accidental, imperfect, or superannuated in- 
stitution. 

If this petition of jurymen be a real bond fide peti- 

*We must always except the Catholic question. Mr. 
Peel's opinions on this subject (giving him credit for sinceri- 
ty), have always been a subject of real surprise to us. It 
must surely be some mistake between the right honourable 
gentleman and his chaplain ! They have been travelling 
together ; and some of the parson's notions have been put 
up in Mr. Peel's head by mistake. We yet hope he will re- 
turn them to their rightful owner. 



tion, not the result of solicitation — and we have no 
reason to doubt it — it is a warning which the legisla- 
ture canript neglect, if it mean to avoid the disgrace of 
seeing the lower and middle orders of mankind making 
laws for themselves, which the government is at 
length compelled to adopt as measures of their own. 
The judges and the Parliament would have gone on to 
this day, hanging, by wholesale, for the forgeries of 
bank notes, if juries had not become weary of the con- 
tinual butchery, and resolved to acquit. The proper 
execution of laws must always depend, in great mea- 
sure, upon public opinion ; and it is undoubtedly most 
discreditable to any men intrusted with power, when 
the governed turn round upon their governors, and 
say, ' Your laws are so cruel, or so foolish, we cannot 
and will not act upon them.' 

The particular improvement, of allowing counsel to 
those who are accused of felony, is so far from being un- 
necessary, from any extraordinary indulgence shown 
to English prisoners, that we really cannot help sus- 
pecting, that not a year elapses in which many inno 
cent persons are not found guilty. How is it possible, 
indeed, that it can be otherwise ? There are seventy 
or eighty persons to be tried for various offences at 
the assizes, who have lain in prison for some months ; 
and fifty of whom, perhaps, are of the lowest order of 
the people, without friends in any better condition than 
themselves, and without one single penny to employ 
in their defence. How are they to obtain witnesses ? 
No attorney can be employed — no subpoena can be 
taken out ; the witnesses are fifty miles off, perhaps — 
totally uninstructed — living from hand to mouth — 
utterly unable to give up their daily occupation to pay 
for their journey, or for their support when arrived at 
the town of trial — and, if they could get there, not 
knowing where to go, or what to do. It is impossible 
but that a human being, in such a helpless situation, 
must be found guilty ; for, as he cannot give evidence 
for himself, and has not a penny to fetch those who 
can give it for him, any story told against him must 
be taken for true (however false) ; since it is impos- 
sible for the poor wretch to contradict it. A brother 
or a sister may come — and support every suffering and 
privation themselves in coming ; but the prisoner 
cannot often have such claims upon the persons who 
have witnessed the transaction, nor any other claims 
but those which an unjustly accused person has upon 
those whose testimony can exculpate him — and who 
probably must starve themselves and their families to 
do it. It is true, a case of life and death will rouse 
the poorest persons, every now and then, to extraor- 
dinary exertions, and they may tramp through mud 
and dirt to the assize town to save a life — though even 
this effort, is precarious enough: but imprisonment, 
hard labour, or transportation, appeal less forcibly 
than death, — and would often appeal for evidence in 
vain, to the feeble and limited resources of extreme 
poverty. It is not that a great proportion of those ac- 
cused are not guilty — but that some are not — and are 
utterly without means of establishing their innocence. 
We do not believe they are often accused from wilful 
and corrupt perjury : but the prosecutor is himself 
mistaken. The crime has been committed ; and in 
his thirst for vengeance, he has got hold of the wrong 
man. The wheat was stolen out of the barn ; and, 
amidst many other collateral circumstances, the wit- 
nesses (paid and brought up by a wealthy prosecutor, 
who is repaid by the county), swear that they saw a 
man, very like the prisoner, with a sack of corn upon 
his shoulder, at an early hour of the morning, going 
from the barn in the direction of the prisoner's cottage ! 
Here is one link, and a very material link, of a long 
chain of circumstantial evidence. Judge and jury 
must give it weight, till it is contradicted. In fact, 
the prisoner did not steal the com ; he was, to be 
sure, out of his cottage at the same hour — and that 
also is proved — but travelling in a totally different 
direction, — and was seen to be so travelling by a stage 
coachman passing by, and by a market gardener. An 
attorney with money in his pocket, whom every mo- 
ment of such employ made richer by six-and-eight 
pence, would have had the two witnesses ready, and 
at rack and manger, from the first day of the assize ; 



166 



WORKS OF THE REV. SIDNEY SMITH. 



and the innocence of the prisoner would have been 
established : but by what possible means is the desti- 
tute ignorant wretch himself to find or to produce 
such witnesses ? or how can the most humane jury, 
and the most acute judge, refuse to consider him as 
guilty, till his witnesses are produced ? We have not 
the slightest disposition to exaggerate, and, on the 
contrary, should be extremely pleased to be convinced 
that our apprehensions were unfounded : but we have 
often felt extreme pain at the hopeless and unprotected 
state of prisoners ; and we cannot find any answer to 
our suspicions, or discover any means by which this 

{>erversion of justice, under the present state of the 
aw, can b« prevented from taking place. Against 
the prisoner are arrayed all the resources of an angry 
prosecutor, who has certainly (let who will be the 
culprit) suffered a serious injury. He has his hand, 
too, in the public purse ; for he prosecutes at the ex- 
pense of the county. He cannot even relent ; for the 
magistrate is bound over to indict. His witnesses 
cannot fail him ,• for they are all bound over by the 
same magistrate to give evidence. He is out of prison, 
too, and can exert himself. 

The prisoner, on the other hand, comes into court, 
squalid and depressed from long confinement — utterly 
unable to tell his own story from want of words and 
want of confidence, and is unable to produce evidence 
for want of money. His. fate accordingly is obvious ; 
^-and that there are many innocent men punished 
every year, for crimes they have not committed, ap- 
pears to us to be extremely probable. It is, indeed, 
scarcely possible it should be otherwise: and, as if to 
prove the fact, every now and then, a case of this 
kind is detected. Some circumstances come to light 
between sentence and execution ; immense exertions 
are made by humane men ; time is gained, and the 
innocence of the condemned person completely estab- 
lished. In Elizabeth Caning's case, two women were 
capitally convicted, ordered for execution — and at last 
found innocent, and respited. Such, too, was the case 
of the men who were sentenced ten years ago, for the 
robbery of Lord Cowper's steward. ' I have myself 
(says Mr. Scarlett) often seen persons I thought inno- 
cent convicted, and the guilty escape, for want of 
some acute and intelligent counsel to show the bear- 
ing of the different circumstances on the conduct and 
situation of the prisoner. '-^-(House of Commons De- 
bates, April 25th, 1826.) We were delighted to see, 
in this last debate, both Mr. Brougham and Mr. Scar- 
lett profess themselves friendly to Mr. Lamb's 
motion. 

But in how many cases has the injustice proceeded 
without any suspicion being excited ? and even if we 
could reckon upon men being watchful in capital 
cases, where life is concerned, we are afraid it is in 
such cases alone that they ever besiege the secretary 
of state, and compel his attention. We never remem- 
any such interference to save a man unjustly con- 
demned to the hulks or the treadmill ; and yet there 
are certainly more condemnations to these minor pun- 
ishments than to the gallows ; but then it is all one — 
who knows or cares about it ? If Harrison or Johnson 
has been condemned, after regular trial by jury, to six 
months' treadmill, because Harrison and Johnson 
were without a penny to procure evidence — who knows 
or cares about Harrison or Johnson? how can they 
make themselves heard ? or in what way can they ob- 
tain redress? It worries rich and comfortable people 
to hear the humanity of our penal laws called in ques- 
tion. There is talk'of a society for employing dis- 
charged prisoners : might not something be effected 
by a society instituted for the purpose of providing to 
poor prisoners a proper defence, and a due attendance 
of witnesses ? But we must hasten on from this dis- 
graceful neglect of poor prisoners, to the particular 
subject of complaint we have proposed to ourselves. 

The proposition is, That the prisoner accused offelo- 
ly ought to have the same power of selecting counsel to 
speak for him as he has in cases of treason and misde- 
meanour, and as defendants have in all civil actions. 

Nothing can be done in any discussion upon any 
point of law in England, without quoting Mr. Justice 
Blackstone. Mr. Justice Blackstone, we believe, gen- 



erally wrote his Commentaries late in the evening, 
with a bottle of wine before him; and little did he 
think, as each sentence fell from the glass and pen, 
of the immense influence it might hereafter exercise 
upon the laws and usages of his country. ' It is' (says 
this favourite writer) ' not at all of a piece with the 
rest of the humane treatment of prisoners by the En- 
glish law ; for upon what face of reason can that as- 
sistance be denied to save the life of a man, which 
yet is allowed him in prosecutions for every petty 
trespass V Nor, indeed, strictly speaking, is it a part 
of our ancient law ; for the Mirror, having observed 
the necessity of counsel in civil suits, who know how 
to forward and defend the cause by the rules of law 
and customs of the realm, immediately subjoins, ' and 
more necessary are they for defence upon indictment 
and appeals of felony, than upon any other venial 
crimes.' To the authority of Blackstone may be add- 
ed that of Sir John Hall, in Hollis's case ; of Sir Ro- 
bert Atkyns, in Lord Russell's case ; and of Sir Bar- 
tholomew Shower, in the arguments for a New Bill of 
Rights, in 16S2. ' In the name of God,' says this 
judge, ' what harm can accrue to the public in general, 
or to any man in particular, that, in cases of State- 
treason, counsel should not be allowed to the accused? 
What rule of justice is there to warrant its denial, 
when, in a civil case of a halfpenny cake, he may 
plead either by himself or by his advocate ? That 
the court is counsel for the prisoner can be no effectu- 
al reason; for so they are for each party, that right 
may be done.' — (Somer's Tracts, vol. ii. p. 56S.) In 
the trial of Thomas Rosewell, a dissenting clergyman, 
for high treason in 16S4, Judge Jeffries, in summing 
up, confessed t© the jury, ' that he thought it a hard 
case, that a man should have counsel to defend him- 
self for a twopenny trespass, and his witnesses be ex- 
amined upon oath; but if he stole, committed murder 
or felony, nay, high treason, where life, estate, hon- 
our, and all were concerned, that he should neither 
have counsel, nor have his witnesses examined upon 
oath.' — Howell's State Trials, vol. x. p. 207. 

There have been two capital errors in the criminal 
codes of feudal Europe, from which a great variety of 
mistake and injustice have proceeded ; the one, a dis- 
position to confound accusation with guilt ; the other, 
to mistake a defence of prisoners accused by the 
crown, for disloyalty and disaffection to the crown ; 
and from these errors our own code has been slowly 
and gradually recovering, by all those struggles and 
exertions which it always costs to remove folly sajic- 
tioned by antiquity. In the early periods of our histGry , 
the accused person could call no evidence : — then, for 
a long time, his evidence against the king could not be 
examined upon oath; consequently, he might as well 
have produced none, as all iii? evidence against him 
was upon oath. Till the reign of Anne, no one accus- 
ed of felony could produce witnesses upon oath; and 
the old practice was vindicated, in opposition to the 
new one, introduced under the statute of that day, on 
the grounds of humanity and tenderness to the pris- 
oner ! because, as his witnesses were not restricted 
by an oath, they were at liberty to indulge in simple 
falsehood as much as they pleased; — so argued the 
blessed defenders of nonsense in those days. Then it 
was ruled to be indecent and improper that counsel 
should be employed against the crown ; and, there- 
fore, the prisoner accused of treason could have no 
counsel to assist him in the trial. Counsel might in- 
deed stay in the court, but apart from the prisoner, 
with whom they could have no communication. They 
were not allowed to put any question, or to suggest 
any doubtful point of law; but if the prisoner (likely 
to be a weak unlettered man) could himself suggest 
any doubt in matter of law, the court determined first 
if the question of law should be entertained, and then 
assigned counsel to argue it. In those times, the jury 
were punishable if they gave a false verdict against 
the king, but were not punishable if they gave a false 
verdict against the prisoner. The preamble of the 
Act of 1696 runs thus — ( Whereas it is expedient that 
persons charged with high treason should make a full 
and sufficient defence.' Might it not be altered to 
persons charged with any species or degree of crime ? 



COUNSEL FOR PRISONERS. 



167 



All these errors have given way to the force of truth, 
and to the power of common sense and common hu- 
manity — the Attorney and Solicitor General, for the 
time being, always protesting against each alteration, 
and regularly and officially prophesying the utter de- 
struction of the whole jurisprudence of Great Britain. 
There is no man now alive, perhaps, so utterly fool- 
ish, as to propose that prisoners should be prevented 
from producing evidence upon oath, and being heard 
by their counsel in cases of high treason ; and yet it 
cost a struggle for seven sessions to get. this measure 
through the two houses of Parliament. But mankind 
are much like the children they beget — they always 
make wry faces at what is to do them good ; and it is 
necessary sometimes to hold the nose, and force the 
medicine down the throat. They enjoy the health 
and vigour consequent upon the medicine : but culf 
the doctor, and sputter at his stuff.' 

A most absurd argument was advanced in the hon. 
ourable house, thai, the practice of employing counsel 
would be such an expense to the prisoner ! — just as if 
any thing Avas so expensive as being hanged ! What 
a hue topic for the ordinary .' i You are going' (sa)^s 
that exquisite divine) ' to be hanged to-morrow, it is 
true, but consider what a sum you have saved ! Mr. 
Scarlett or Mr. Brougham might certainly have pre- 
sented arguments to the jury, which would have in- 
sured your acquittal ; but do you forget that gentle- 
men of their eminence must be recompensed by large 
fees, and that, if your life had been saved, you would 
actually have been out of pocket above 20/.? You 
will now die with the consciousness of having obeyed 
the dictates of a wise economy ; and with a grateful 
reverence for the laws of your country, which prevents 
you from running into such unbounded expense — so let 
us now go to prayers.' 

It is ludicrous enough to recollect, when the em- 
ployment of counsel is" objected to on account of the 
expense to the prisoner, that the same merciful law, 
which, to save the prisoner's money has denied him 
counsel, and produced his conviction, seizes upon all 
his savings the moment he is convicted. 

Of all false and foolish dicta, the most trite and the 
most absurd is that which asserts that the judge is 
counsel for the prisoner. We do not hesitate to say 
that this is merely an unmeaning phrase, invented to 
defend a pernicious abuse. The judge cannot be coun- 
sel for the prisoner, ought not to be counsel for the 
prisoner, never is counsel for the prisoner. To force 
an ignorant man into a court of justice, and to tell 
him that the judge is his counsel, appears to us quite 
as foolish as to set a hungry man down to his meals, 
and to tell him that the table was his dinner. In the 
first place, a counsel should always have private and 
previous communication with the prisoner, which the 
judge, of course, cannot have. The prisoner reveals 
to his counsel how far he is guilty, or he is not ; states 
to him all the circumstance of his case — and might 
often enable his advocate, if his advocate were allow- 
ed to speak, to explain a long string of circumstantial 
evidence, in a manner favourable to the innocence of 
his client. Of all these advantages, the judge, if he 
had every disposition to befriend the prisoner, is of 
course deprived. Something occurs to a prisoner in 
the course of the cause ; he suggests it in a whisper 
to his counsel, doubtful if it is a wise point to urge or 
not. His counsel thinks it of importance, and would 
urge it, if his mouth were not shut. Can a prisoner 
have this secret communication with a judge, and 
take his advice, whether or not he, the judge, shall 
mention it to the jury? The counsel has (after all 
the evidence has been given) a bad opinion of his cli- 
ent's case ; but he suppresses that opinion ; and it is 
nis duty to do so. He is not to decide ; that is the 
province of the jury : and, in spite of his own opinion, 
his client may be innocent. He is brought there (or 
would be brought there if the privilege of speech were 
allowed) for the express purpose of saying all that 
could be said on one side of the question. He is a 
weight in one scale, and some one else holds the ba- 
lance. This is the way in which truth is elicited in 
civil, and would be in criminal cases. But does the 
Judge ever assume the appearance of'Delieving a pris- 



j oner to be innocent whom he thinks to be guilty? If 
the prisoner advances inconclusive or weak arguments, 
' does not the judge say they are weak and inconclu- 
sive, and does he not often sum up against his own 
client ? How then is he counsel for the prisoner ? If 
the counsel for the prisoner were to see a strong point, 
which the counsel for the prosecution had missed, 
would he supply the deficiency of his antagonist, and 
urge what had been neglected to be urged { But is it 
not the imperious duty of the judge to do so? How 
then can these two functionaries stand in the same re- 
lation to the prisoner l In fact the only meaning of 
the phrase is this, that the judge will not suffer any 
undue advantage to be taken of the ignorance and 
helplessness of the prisoner — that he will point out 
any evidence or circumstance in his favour — and see 
that equal justice is done to both parties. But in this 
sense he is as much the counsel of the prosecutor as 
of the prisoner. This is all the judge can do, or even 
pretends to do ; but he can have no previous commu- 
nication with the prisoner — he can have no confiden- 
tial communication in court with the prisoner before 
he sums up ; he cannot fling the whole weight of his 
understanding into the opposite scale against the 
counsel for the prosecution, and produce that collision 
of faculties, which, in all other cases but those of 
felony, is supposed to be the happiest method of ar- 
riving at truth. Baron Garrow, in his charge to the 
grand jury at Exeter, on the 16th of August, 1824. 
thus expressed his opinion of a judge being counsel 
for the prisoner. ' It has been said, and truly said, 
that in criminal courts, judges were counsel for the 
prisoners. So undoubtedly they were, as far as they 
could to prevent undue prejudice, to guard against im- 
proper influence being excited against prisoners ; but 
it was impossible for them to go farther than this ; 
for they could not suggest the course of defence pris- 
oners ought to pursue ; for judges only saw the depo- 
sitions so short a time before the accused appeared 
at the bar of their country, that it was quite impossi- 
ble for them to act fully in that capacity.' The learn, 
ed Baron might have added, that it would be more 
correct to call the judge counsel for the prosecution, 
for his only previous instructions were the depositions 
for the prosecution, from which, in the absence of 
counsel, he examined the evidence against the pris- 
oner. On the prisoner's behalf he had no instructions 
at all. 

Can any thing, then, be more flagrantly and scanda- 
lously unjust, than, in a long case of circumstantial 
evidence, to refuse to a prisoner the benefit of coun- 
sel? A foot-mark, a word, a sound, a tool dropped,— 
all gave birth to the most ingenious inferences ; and 
the counsel for the prosecution is so far from being 
blamable for entering into all these things, that they 
are all essential to the detection of guilt, and they are 
all links of a long and intricate chain : but if a close 
examination into, and a logical statement of, all these 
circumstances be necessary for the establishment of 
guilt, is not the same closeness of reasoning and the 
same logical statement necessary for the establish- 
ment of innocence ? If justice cannot be done to soci- 
ety without the intervention of a practised and ingeni- 
ous mind, who may connect all these links together, 
and make them clear to the apprehension of a jury,— 
can nisi ice be done to the prisoner, unless similar 
practice and similar ingenuity are employed to detect 
the flaws of the chain, and to point out the disconnec- 
tion of the circumstances? 

Is there any one gentleman in the House of Com- 
mons, who, in yielding his vote to this paltry and 
perilous fallacy of the judge being counsel for the 
prisoner, does not feel, that, were he himself a crimi- 
nal, he would prefer almost any counsel at the bar,— 
to the tender mercies of the judge ? How strange 
that any man who could make his election would 
eagerly and diligently surrender this exquisite privi- 
lege, and addict himself to the perilous practice of 
giving fees to counsel ? Nor let us forget, in consid- 
ering judges as counsel for the prisoner, that there 
have been such men as Chief Justice Jeffries, Mr. 
Justice Page, and Mr. Justice Alybone, and that, — ia 
bad times, such men may reappear. ' If you do not 



WORKS OF THE REV. SIDNEY SMITH. 



allow me counsel, my lords (says LordLovat), it is im- 
possible for me to make any defence, by reason of my 
infirmity. I do not see, I do not hear. I come up to the 
bar at the hazard of my life. I have fainted several 
times, I have been up so early, ever since four o'clock 
this morning. I therefore ask for assistance ; and if you 
do not allow me counsel, or such aid as is necessary, 
it will be impossible for me to make any defence at all.' 
Though Lord Lovat's guilt was evident, yet the man- 
agers of the impeachment felt so strongly the injustice 
which was done, that, by the hands of Sir W. Young, 
the chief manager, a bill was brought into parliament, 
to allow counsel to persons impeached by that house, 
which was not previously the case ; so that the evil is 
already done away with, in a great measure, to per- 
sons of rank : it so happens in legislation, when a 
gentleman suffers, public attention is awakened to the 
evil of laws. Every man who makes laws says, — 
This may be my case :' but it requires the repeated 
efforts of humane men, or, as Mr. North calls them, — 
dilettanti philosophers, to awaken the attention of 
lawmakers to evils from which they are themselves 
exempt. We do not say this to make the leaders of 
mankind unpopular, but to rouse their earnest atten- 
tion in cases where the poor only are concerned, — and 
where neither good nor evil can happen to themselves. 
A great stress is laid upon the moderation of the 
opening counsel ; that is, he does not conjure the far- 
mers in the jury-box, by the love which they bear to 
their children — he does not declaim upon blood guilti- 
ness — he does not describe the death of Abel by Caiu ? 
the first murderer — he does not describe scattered 
brains, ghastly wounds, pale features, and hair clotted 
with gore — he does not do a thousand things, which 
are not in English taste, and which it would be very 
foolish and very vulgar to do. We really allow all 
this. But yet, if it be a cause of importance, it is es- 
sentially necessary to our counsellor's reputation that 
his man should be hung ! And accordingly, with a 
very calm voice, and composed manner, and with 
many expressions of candour, he sets himself to com- 
ment astutely upon the circumstances. Distant events 
are immediately connected ; meaning is given to in- 
significant facts ; new motives are ascribed to innocent 
actions ; farmer gives way after farmer in the jury- 
box ; and a rope of eloquence is woven round the pri- 
soner's neck ! Every one is delighted with the talents 
of the advocate ; and because there has been no noise, 
no violent action, and no consequent perspiration, he 
is praised for his candour and forbearance, and the len 
ity of our laws is the theme of universal approbation. 
In the mean time, the speech-maker and the prisoner 
know better. *• 

We should be glad to know of any nation in the 
world, taxed by by kings, or even imagined by poets 
(except the English), who have refused to prisoners 
the benefit of counsel. Why is the voice of humani- 
ty heard every where else, and disregarded here ? In 
Scotland, the accused have not only counsel to speak 
for them, but a copy of the indictment, and a list of 
the witnesses. In France, in the Netherlands, in the 
whole of Europe, counsel are allotted as a matter of 
course. Every where else but here, accusation is con- 
sidered as unfavourable to the exercise of human facul- 
ties. It is admitted to be that crisis in which, above 
all others, an unhappy man wants the aid of elo- 
quence, wisdom, and coolness. In France the Napo- 
leon code has provided not only that counsel should 
be allowed to the prisoner, but that, as with us in Scot- 
land, his counsel should have the last word. 

It is a most affecting moment in a court of justice, 
when the evidence has all been heard, and the judge 
asks the prisoner what he has to say in his defence. 
The prisoner, who has (by great exertions, perhaps of 
his friends,) saved up money enough to procure coun- 
sel, says to the judge, ' that he leaves his defence to 
his counsel.' We have often blushed for English hu- 
manity to hear the reply. ' Your counsel cannot speak 
for you, you must speak for yourself; and this is the 
reply given to a poor girl of eighteen — to a foreigner 
— to a deaf man — to a stammerer — to the sick — to the 
feeble— to the old— to the most abject and ignorant of 
human beings ! It is a reply, we must say, at which 



common sense and common feeling revolt : — for it is 
full of brutal cruelty, and of base inattention of those 
who make laws, to the happiness of those for whom 
laws were made. We wonder that any juryman can 
convict under such a shocking violation of all natural 
justice. The iron age of Clovis and Clottaire can pro- 
duce no more atrocious violation of every good feel- 
ing, and every good principle. Can a sick man find 
strength and nerves to speak before a large assembly ? 
— can an ignorant man find words? — can a low man 
find confidence ? Is not he afraid of becoming an ob- 
ject of ridicule ? — can he believe that his expressions 
will be understood ? How often have we seen a poor 
wretch, struggling against the agonies of his spirit, 
and the rudeness of his conceptions, and his awe of 
better dressed men and better taught men, and the 
shame which the accusation has brought upon his 
head, and the sight of his parents and children gazing 
at him in the court, for the last time, perhaps, and 
alter a long absence ? The mariner sinking in the 
wave does not want a helping hand more than does 
this poor wretch. But help is denied to all ! Age 
cannot have it, nor ignorance, nor the modesty of wo- 
men .' One hard uncharitable rule silences the defen- 
ders of the wretched, in the worst of human evils ; 
and at the bitterest of human moments, mercy is 
blotted out from the ways of men ! 

Suppose a crime to have been committed under the 
influence of insanity; is the insane man, now conva- 
lescent, to plead his own insanity ? — to offer arguments 
to show that he must have been mad ? — and, by the 
glimmerings of his returning reason, to prove that, at 
a former period, that same reason was utterly extinct ? 
These are the cruel situations into which judges and 
courts of justice are thrown by the present state of the 
law. 

There is a judge now upon the bench, who never 
took away the life of a fellow creature without shut- 
ting himself up alone and giving the most profound at- 
tention to every circumstance of the case ! and this 
solemn act he always premises with his own beauti- 
ful prayer to God, that he will enlighten him with his 
Divine Spirit in the exercise of this terrible privilege ! 
Now would it not be an immense satisfaction to this 
feeling and honourable magistrate, to be sure that eve- 
ry witness on the side of the prisoner had been heard, 
and that every argument which could be urged in his 
favour had been brought forward, by a man whose 
duty it was to see only" on one side of the question, 
and whose interest and reputation was thoroughly em- 
barked in this partial exertion ? If a judge fails to get 
at the truth, after these instruments of investigation 
are used, his failure must be attributed to the limited 
powers of man — not to the want of good inclination, or 
wise institutions. We are surprised that such a mea- 
sure does not come into Parliament, with the strong 
recommendation of the judges. It is surely better to 
be a day longer on the circuit, than to murder rapidly 
in ermine. 

It is argued, that, among the various pleas for mer- 
cy that are offered, no prisoner has ever urged to the 
secretary of state the disadvantage of having no coun- 
sel to plead for him ; but a prisoner who dislikes to 
undergo his sentence, naturally addresses to those who 
can reverse it such arguments' only as will produce, in 
the opinion of the referee, a pleasing effect. He does 
not therefore fiud fault with the established system of 
jurisprudence, but brings forward facts and arguments 
to prove his own innocence. Besides, how few peo- 
ple there are who can elevate themselves from the ac- 
quiescence in what is, to the consideration of what 
ought to be • and if they could do so, the way to get 
rid of a punishment is not (as we have just observed) 
to say, ' you have no right to puuish me in this man- 
ner,' but to say, ' I am innocent of the offence.' The 
fraudulent baker at Constantinople, who is about to be 
baked to death in his own oven, does not complain of 
the severity of baking bakers, but promises to use 
more flour and less fraud. 

Whence comes it (we should like to ask Sir John 
Singleton Copley, who seems to dread so much the 
conflicts of talent in criminal cases) that a method of 
getting at truth which is found so serviceable in civil 



COUNSEL FOR PRISONERS. 



1.-J9 



cases should be so much objected to in criminal ca- 
ses? Would you have all this wrangling and bicker- 
ing, it is asked, and contentious eloquence, when the 
life of a man is concerned? Why not, as well as 
when his property is concerned? It is either a good 
means of doing justice, or it is not, that two under 
standings should be put in opposition to each other, 
and that a third should decide between them. Does 
this open every view which can bear upon the ques 
tion ? Does it in the most effectual manner watch the 
judge, detect perjury, and sift evidence? If not, why 
is it suffered to disgrace our civil institutions? If it 
effect all these objects, why is it not incorporated into 
our criminal law ? Of what importance is a little dis- 
gust at professional tricks, if the solid advantage gain- 
ed is a nearer approximation to truth? Can any thing 
be more preposterous than this preference of taste to 
justice, and of solemnity to truth 2 What an eulogium 
of a trial to say, ' I am by no means satisfied that the 
jury were right in finding the prisoner guilty ; but eve- 
ry thing was carried on with the utmost decorum. 
The verdict was wrong ; but there was the most per- 
fect propriety and order in the proceedings. The man 
will be unfairly hanged ; but all was genteel V If so- 
lemnity is what is principally wanted in a court of 
justice", we had better study the manners of the old 
Spanish Inquisition ; but if battles with the judge, and 
battles among the counsel, are the best method, as 
they certainly are, of getting at the truth, better tole- 
rate this philosophical Billingsgate, than persevere, 
because the fife of a man is at stake, in solemn and 
polished injustice. 

Why would it not be just as wise and equitable to 
leave the defendant without counsel in civil cases, and 
to tell him that the judge was his counsel? And if 
the reply is to produce such injurious effects as are 
anticipated upon the minds of the jury in criminal 
cases, why not in civil cases also ? In twenty-eight 
cases out of thirty, the verdict in civil cases is correct : 
in the two remaining cases, the error may proceed 
from other causes than the right of reply ; and yet the 
right of reply has existed iu all. In a vast majority 
of cases, the verdict, is for the plaintiff, not because 
there is a right ot reply, but because he who has it in 
his power to decide whether he will go to law or not, 
and resolves to expose himself to the expense and 
trouble of a lawsuit, has probably a good foundation 
for his claim. Nobody, of course, can intend to say 
that the majority of verdicts in favour of plaintiffs are 
against justice, and merely attributable to the advan- 
tage of a last speech. If this were the case, the sooner 
advocates are turned out of court the better— and then 
the improvement of both civil and criminal law would 
be an abolition of ail speeches ; for those who dread 
the effect of the last word upon the fate of the priso- 
ner, must remember that there is at present always a 
last speech against the prisoner } for, as the counsel 
for the prosecution cannot be replied to, his is the last 
speech. 

There is certainly this difference between a civil 
and a criminal case — that in one a new trial can 
be granted, in the other not. But you must first make 
up your mind whether this system of contentious in- 
vestigation by opposite advocates is or is not the best 
method of getting at truth: if it be, the more irreme- 
diable the decision, the more powerful and perfect 
should be the means of deciding ; and then it would 
be a less oppression if the civil defendent were de- 
prived of counsel than the criminal prisoner. When 
an error has been committed, the advantage is greater 
to the latter of these persons than to the former ; the 
criminal is not tried again, but pardoned ; while the 
civil defendant must run the chance of another jury. 

If the effect of reply, and the contention, of counsel 
have all these baneful consequences in felony, why 
not also in misdemeanour and high treason ? Halt the 
cases at sessions are cases of misdemeanour, where 
counsel are employed and half-informed justices pre- 
side instead of learned judges. There are no com- 
plaints of the unfairness of verdicts, though there are 
every now and then of the severity of punishments. 
Now, if the reasoning of Mr. Lamb's opponents were 
true, the disturbing force of the prisoner's counsel 



must fling every thing into confusion. The court fa 
misdemeanours must be a scene of riot and perpiexi 
ty ; and the detection and punishment of crime must 
be utterly impossible : and yet in the very teeth of 
these objections, such courts of justice are just as or- 
derly in one set of offences as the other ; and the con- 
viction of a guilty person just as certain and as easy. 

The prosecutor (if this system were altered) would 
have the choice of counsel : so he has now — with this 
difference, that, at present, his counsel cannot be an- 
swered nor opposed. It would be better in all cases, 
if two men of exactly equal talent could be opposed 
to each other ; but as this is impossible, the system 
must be taken with this inconvenience ; but there can 
be no inequality between counsel so great as that be- 
tween any counsel and the prisoner pleading for him- 
self. < It has been lately my lot,' says Mr. Denman, 
1 to try two prisoners who were deaf and dumb, and 
who could only be made to understand what was 
passing by the signs of their friends. The cases were 
clear and simple ; but if they had been circumstantial 
cases, in what a situation would the judge and jury be 
placed, when the prisoner could have no counsel to 
plead for him. — Debates of the House of Commons, 
April, 25, 1826. 

The folly of being counsel for yourself is so notori- 
ous in civil cases, that it has grown into a proverb. 
But the cruelty of the law compels a man, in criminal 
cases, to be guilty of a much greater act of folly, and 
to trust his life to an advocate, who, by the common 
sense' of mankind, is pronounced to be inadequate to 
defend the possession of an acre of land. In all cases 
it must be supposed, that reasonably convenient in- 
struments are selected to effect the purpose in view. 
A judge may be commonly presumed to understand 
his profession, and a jury to have a fair allowance of 
common sense ; but the objectors to the improvement 
we recommend appear to make no such suppositions. 
Counsel are always to make flashy addresses to the 
passions. Juries are to be so much struck with them, 
that they are always to acquit or to condemn, contra- 
ry to justice ; and judges are always to be so biassed, 
that they are to fling themselves rashly into the oppo- 
site scale against the prisoner. Many cases of misde- 
meanour consign a man to infamy, and cast a blot 
upon his posterity. Judges and juries must feel these 
cases as strongly as any cases of felony ; and yet, in 
spite of this, and in spite of the free permission of 
counsel to speak, they preserve their judgment, and 
command their feelings, surprisingly. Generally speak- 
ing, we believe none of these evils would take place. 
Trumpery declamation would be considered as discre- 
ditable to the counsel, and would be disregarded by 
the jury. The judge and jury (as in civil cases) would 
gain the habit of looking to the facts, selecting the 
arguments, and coming to reasonable conclusions. It 
is so in all other countries, and it would be so in this. 
But the vigilance of the judge is to relax, if there is 
counsel for the prisoner. Is, then, the relaxed vigi- 
lance of the judges complained of, in high treason, 
in misdemeanour, or in civil cases ? This appears to 
us really to shut up the debate, and to preclude reply. 
Why is' the practice so good in all other cases, and so 
pernicious in felony alone ? This question has never 
received even the shadow of an answer. There is no 
one objection against the allowance of counsel to pri 
soners in felony, which does not apply to them in all 
cases. If the vigilance of judges depend upon this in- 
justice to the prisoner, then, the greater injustice to 
the prisoner, the more vigilance ; and so the true me- 
thod of perfecting the Bench would be, to deny the 
prisoner the power of calling witnesses, and to in- 
crease, as much as possible, the disparity between the 
accuser and the accused. We hope men are selected 
for the Judges of Israel, whose vigilance depends upon 
better and higher principles. 

But the most singular caprice of the law is, that 
counsel are permitted in very high crimes, and in very 
small crimes, and denied in crimes of a sort of medi- 
um description. In high treason, where you mean to 
murder Lord Liverpool, and to levy war against the 
people, and to blow up the two houses of Parliament 
all the lawyers of Westminster Hall may talk them- 



170 



WORKS OF THE REV. SIDNEY SMITH. 



selves dry, and the jury deaf. Lord Eldon, when at 
the bar, has been heard for nine hours on such sub- 
jects. If, instead of producing the destruction of five 
thousand people, you are indicted for the murder of 
one person, here human faculties, from the diminution 
of guilt, are supposed to be so clear and unclouded, 
that the prisoner is quite adequate to make his own 
defence, and no cousel *re allowed. Take it, then, 
upon that principle ; and let the rule, and the reason 
of it, pass as sufficient. But if, instead of murdering 
the man, you have only libelled him, then, for some 
reason or another, though utterly unknown to us, the 
original faculties in accused persons is respected, and 
counsel are allowed. Was qver such nonsense defend- 
ed by public men in grave assemblies ? The prosecu- 
tor, too, (as Mr. Horace Twiss justly observes) can 
either allow or disallow counsel, by selecting his form 
of prosecution ; as where a mob had assembled to re- 
peal, by riot and force, some unpopular statute, and 
certain persons had continued in that assembly for 
more than an hour after proclamation to disperse. — 
That might be treated as levying war against the 
king, and then the prisoner would be entitled to receive 
(as Lord George Gordon did receive) the benefit of 
counsel. It might also be treated as a seditious riot ; 
then it would be a misdemeanor, and counsel would 
still be allowed. But if government had a mind to de- 
stroy the prisoner effectually, they have only to ab- 
stain from the charge of treason, and to introduce into 
the indictment the aggravation, that the prisoner had 
continued with the mob for an hour after proclamation 
to disperse ; this is a felony, the prisoner's life is in 
jeopardy, and counsel are effectually excluded. It pro- 
duces, in many other cases disconnected with treason, 
the most scandalous injustice. A receiver of stolen 
goods, who employs a young girl to rob her master, 
may be tried for the misdemeanour; the young girl, 
taken afterwards, would be tried for the felony. The 
receiver would be punishable only with fine, imprison- 
ment, or whipping, and he could have counsel to de- 
fend him. The girl indicted for felony, and liable to 
death, would enjoy no such advantage. 

In the comparison between felony and treason, there 
are certainly some arguments why counsel should be 
allowed in felony rather than in treason. Persons ac- 
cused of treason are generally persons of education 
and rank, accustomed to assemblies, and to public 
speaking, while men accused of felony are commonly 
of the lowest of the people. If it be true, that judges, 
in cases of high treason, are more liable to be influ- 
enced by the crown, and to lean against the prisoner, 
this cannot apply to cases of misdemeanour, or to the 
defendants in civil cases ; but if it be necessary that 
judges should be watched in political cases, how often 
are cases of felony connected with political disaffec- 
tion ? Every judge, too, has his idiosyncrasies, which 
require to be watched. Some hate Dissenters, some 
mobs ; some have one weakness, some another ; and 
the ultimate truth is, that no court of justice is safe, 
unless there is some one present whose occupation and 
interest it is to watch the safety of the prisoner. Till 
then, no man of right feeling can be easy at the ad- 
ministration of justice, and the punishment of death. 

Two men are accused of one offence ; the one dex- 
terous, bold, subtle, gifted with speech, and remarka- 
ble for presence of mind ; the other timid, hesitating, 
and confused ; is there any reason why the chances of 
these two men for acquittal should be, as they are, so 
very different ? Inequalities there will be in the means 
of defence under the best system, but there is no occa- 
sion the law should make these greater than they are 
left to chance and nature. 

But (it is asked) what practical injustice is done — 
what practical evil is there in the present system ? 
The great object of all law is, that the guilty should 
be punished, and the innocent should be acquitted. A 
very great majority of prisoners, we admit, are guilty, 
and so clearly guilty, that we believe they would be 
found guilty under any system : but among the number 
of those who are tried., some are innocent, and the 
chance of establishing their innocence is very much 
diminished by the privation of counsel. In the course 
of twenty or thirty years, among the whole mass of 



English prisoners, we believe many are found guilty 
who are innocent, and would not have been found 
guilty, if an able and intelligent man had watched 
over their interest, and represented their ?ase. If this 
happen only to two or three every year, it is quite a 
sufficient reason why the law should be altered. That 
such cases exist we firmly believe ; and this is the 
practical evil — perceptible to men of sense and reflec- 
tion ; but not likely to become the subject of general 
petition. To ask why there are not petitions — why the 
evil is not more noticed, is mere parliamentary froth 
and ministerial juggling. Gentlemen are rarely hung. 
If they were so, there would be petitions without end 
for counsel. The creatures exposed to the cruelties 
and injustice of the law are dumb creatures, who feel 
the evil without being able to express their feelings. 
Besides, the question is not, whether the evil is found 
out, but whether the evil exist. Whoever thinks it 
is an evil should vote against it, whether the sufferer 
from the injustice discover it to be an injustice, or 
whether he suffer in ignorant silence. When the bill 
was enacted, which allowed counsel for treason, 
there was not a petition from one end of England 
to the other. Can there be a more shocking answer 
from the ministerial bench, than to say, For real 
evil we care nothing — only for detected evil? We 
will set about curing any wrong which affects our 
popularity and power: but as to any other evil, we 
wait till the people find it out ; and, in the mean time, 
commit such evils to the care of Mr. George Lamb, 
and of Sir James Mackintosh. We are sure so 
good a man as Mr. Peel can never feel in this man- 
ner. 

Howard devoted himself to his country. It was a 
noble example. Let two gentlemen on the ministerial 
side of the house (we only ask for two) commit some 
crimes, which will render their execution a matter of 
painful necessity. Let them feel, and report to the 
house, all the injustice and inconvenience of having 
neither a copy of the indictment, nor a list of witness- 
es, nor counsel to defend them. We will venture to 
say, that the evidence of two such persons would do 
more for the improvement of the criminal law, than 
all the orations of Mr. Lamb, or the lucubrations of 
Beccaria. Such evidence would save time, and bring 
the question to an issue. It is a great duty, and 
ought to be fulfilled ; and, in ancient Rome, would 
have been fulfilled. 

The opponents always forget that Mr. Lamb's plan 
is not to compel prisoners to have counsel, but to allow 
them to have counsel if they choose to do so. Depend 
upon it, as Dr. Johnson says, when a man is going to 
be hanged, his faculties are wonderfully concentrated. 
If it be really true, as the defenders of Mumpsimus 
observe, that the judge is the best counsel for the 
prisoner, the prisoner will soon learn to employ him, 
especially as his lordship works without fees. All that 
we want is an option 'given to the prisoner, that a man, 
left to adopt his own means of defence in every trifling 
civil right, may have the same power of selecting his 
own auxiliaries for higher interests. 

But nothing can be more unjust than to speak of 
judges, as if they were of one standard, and one heart 
and head pattern. The great majority of judges, we 
have no doubt, are upright and pure ; but some have 
been selected for flexible politics — some are passion- 
ate — some are in a hurry — some are violent church- 
men — some resemble ancient females — some have the 
gout— some are eighty years old— some are blind, 
deaf, and have lost the power of smelling. All one to 
the unhappy prisoner — he has no choice. 

It is impossible to put so gross an insult upon judg- 
es, jurymen, grand-jusymen, or any person connected 
with the administration of justice, as to suppose that 
the longer time to be taken up by speeches of counsel 
constitutes the grand bar to the proposed alteration. 
If three hours would acquit a man, and he is hanged 
because he is only allowed two hours for his defence, 
the poor man is as much murdered as if his throat had 
been cut before he came into court. If twelve judges 
cannot do the most perfect justice, other twelve must 
be appointed. Strange administration of criminal law, 
to adhere obstinately to an inadequate number of 



CATHOLIC QUESTION. 



171 



judges, and to refuse any improvement which is in- 
compatible with this arbitrary and capricious enact- 
ment. Neither is it quite certain that the proposed 
alteration would create a greater demand upon the 
lime of the court. At present the counsel makes a 
defence by long cross-examinations and examinations 
in chief of the witnesses, and the judge allows a great- 
er latitude than he would do, if the counsel of the pri- 
soner were permitted to speak. The counsel by these 
oblique methods, and by stating false points of law 
for the express purpose of introducing facts, endea- 
vours to obviate the injustice of the law, and takes up 
more time by this oblique, than he would do by a di- 
rect defence. But the best answer to this objection of 
time (which, if true, is no objection at all) is, that as 
many misdemeanors as felonies are tried in a given 
time, though counsel are allowed in the former, and 
not in the latter case. 

One excuse for the absence of counsel is that the evi- 
dence upon which the prisoner is convicted is always 
so clear, that the counsel cannot gainsay it. This is 
mere absurdity. There is not, and cannot be such a 
rule. Many a man has been hung upon a string of cir- 
cumstantial evidence, which not only very ingenious 
men, but very candid and judicious men, might criti- 
cise and call in question. If no one were found guilty 
but upon such evidence as would not admit of a doubt, 
half the crimes in the world would be unpunished. 
This dictum, by which the present practice has often 
been defended, was adopted by Lord Chancellor Not- 
tingham. To the lot ot this chancellor, however, it 
fell to pass sentence of death upon Lord Stafford, 
whom (as Mr. Denman justly observes) no court of 
justice, not even the house of lords (constituted as it 
was in those days) could have put to death, it he had 
had counsel to defend him. 

To improve the criminal law of England, and to 
make it really deserving of the incessant eulogium 
which is lavished upon it, we would assimilate tri- 
als for felony to trials for high treason. The pri- 
soner should not only have counsel, but a copy 
of the indictment and a list of the witnesses, many 
days antecedent to the trial. It is in the highest de- 
gree, unjust that I should not see and study the de- 
scription of the crime with which I am charged, if the 
most scrupulous exactness be required in that instru- 
ment which charges me with crime. If the place where, 
the time when, and the manner how, and the persons by 
whom, must all be specified with the most perfect ac- 
curacy, if any deviation from this accuracy is fatal, the 
prisoner, or his legal advisers, should have a full oppor- 
tunity ot judging whether the scruples of the law have 
been attended to in the formation of the indictment ; 
and they ought not to be confined to the hasty and im- 
perfect consideration which can be given to an indict- 
ment exhibited for the first time in court. Neither is 
it possible for the prisoner to repel accusation till he 
knows who is to be brought against him. He may 
see suddenly, stuck up in the witness's box, a man 
who has been writing him letters, to extort money 
from the threat of evidence he could produce. The 
character of such a witness would be destroyed in a 
moment, if the letters were produced ; and the letters 
would have been produced, of course, if the prisoner 
had imagined such a person would have been brought 
forward by the prosecutor. It is utterly impossible 
r"or a prisoner to know in what way he may be assail- 
ed, and against what species of attack he is to guard. 
Conversations may be brought against him which he 
has forgotten, and to which he could (upon notice) 
have given another colour and complexion. Actions 
are made to bear upon his case, which (if he had 
known they would have been referred to) might have 
been explained hi the most satisfactory manner. All 
these modes of attack are pointed out by the list 
of witnesses transmitted to the prisoner, and he has 
time to prepare his answer, as it is perfectly just he 
should have. This is justice, when a prisoner has 
ample means of compelling the attendance of his wit- 
nesses; when his written accusation is put into his 
hand, and he has time to study it — when he knows in 
what maimer his guilt is to be proved, and when he 
has a man of practised understanding to state his 



facts, and prefer his arguments. Then criminal jus- 
tice may march on boldly. The judge has no stain of 
blood on his ermine ; and the phrases which English 
people are so fond of lavishing upon the humanity of 
their laws, will have a real foundation. At present 
this part of the law is a mere relic of the barbarous in- 
justice by which accusation in the early part of our ju- 
risprudence was always confounded with guilt. The 
greater part of these abuses have been brushed away, 
as this cannot fail soon to be. In the mean time it is 
defended (as every other abuse has been defended) 
by men who think it their duty to defend every thing 
which is, and to dread every thing which is not. We 
are told that the judge does what he does not do, and 
ought not to do. The most pernicious effects are an- 
ticipated in trials of felony, from that which is found 
to produce the most perfect justice in civil causes, and 
in cases of treason and misdemeanor : we are called 
upon to continue a practice without example in any 
other country, and are required by lawyers to consider 
that custom as humane, which every one who is not a 
lawyer pronounces to be most cruel and unjust — ana 
which has not been brought forward to general notice, 
only because its bad effects are confined to the last 
and lowest of mankind.* 



CATHOLICS. (Edinburgh Review, 1827.) 
1. A Plain Statementin support of the Political Claims of the 
Roman Catholics ; in a Letter to the Rev. Sir George Lee, 
Bart. By Lord Nugent, Member of Parliament for Ayles- 
bury. London, Hookham. 1S26. 
3. A Letter to Viscount Milton, M. P. By One of his Con- 
stituents. London, Ridgway. 1827. 
3. Charge by the Archbishop of Cashel. Dublin, Milliken. 

If a poor man were to accept a guinea upon the 
condition that he spoke all the evil he could of another 
whom he believed to be innocent, and whose priva- 
tions he knew he should increase by his false testi- 
mony, would not the person so hired be one of the 
worst and basest of human beings ? And would not 
his guilt be aggravated, if, up to the moment of re- 
ceiving his aceldama, he had spoken in terms of high 
praise of the person whom he subsequently accused ? 
Would not the latter feature of the case prove him to 
be as much without shame as the former evinced him 
to be without principle ? Would the guilt be less, if the 
person so hired were a man of education ? Would it be 
less, if he were above want '( Would it be less, if the 
profession and occupation of his life were to decide 
men's rights, or to teach them morals and religion ? 
Would it be less by the splendour of the bribe ? Does a 
bribe of 3000Z. leave a man innocent, whom a bribe of 
30Z. would cover with infamy ? You are of a mature pe- 
riod of life, when the opinions of an honest man ought 
to be, and are fixed. On Monday you were a barrister 
or a country clergyman, a serious and temperate friend 
to religious liberty and Catholic emancipation. In a 
few weeks from this time you are a bishop, or a dean, 
of a judge — publishing and speaking charges and ser- 
mons against the poor Catholics, and explaining away 
this sale of your soul by every species of falsehood, 
shabbiness, and equivocation. You may carry a bit 
of ermine on your shoulder, or hide the lower moiety 
of the body in a silken petticoat — and men may call 
you Mr. Dean, or My Lord ; but you have sold your 
honour and your conscience for money ; and, though 
better paid, you are as base as the witness who stands 
at the door of the judgment-hall, to swear whatever 
the suborner will put into his mouth, and to receive 
whatever he will put in his pocket. f 

When soldiers exercise, there stands a goodly port- 
ly person out of the ranks, upon whom all eyes are 
directed, and whose signs and motions, in the per- 



* All this nonsense is now put an end to. Counsel is al- 
lowed to the prisoner, and they are permitted to speak in his 
defence. 

t It is very far from our intention to say that all who 
were for the Catholics, and are now against them, have 
made this change from base motives ; it is equally far from 
our intention not to say that many men of both professions 
have subjected themselves to this shocking imputation. 



172 



WORKS OF THE REV. SIDNEY SMITH. 



formance of the manual exercise, all the soldiers fol- 
low. The Germans, we believe, call him a Flugel- 
man. We propose Lord Nugent as a political flugel- 
man ; — he is always consistent, plain and honest, 
steadily and straightly pursuing his object without 
hope or fear, under the influence of good feelings and 
high principle. The House of Commons does not con- 
tain within its walls a more honest, upright man. 

We seize upon the opportunity which this able 
pamphlet of his lordship affords us, to renew our at- 
tention to the Catholic question. There is little new 
to be said; but we must not be silent, or, in these 
days of baseness and tergiversation, we shall be sup- 
posed to have deserted our friend the Pope ; and they 
will say of us, Prostant venalesapud Lambeth et White- 
hall. God forbid it should ever be said of us with 
justice — it is pleasant to loll and roll, and to accumu- 
late — to be a purple and fine linen man, and to be 
called by some of those nicknames which frail and 
ephemeral beings are so fond of accumulating upon 
each other ; — but the best thing of all is to live like 
honest men, and to add something to the cause of 
liberality, justice, and truth. 

The Letter to Lord Milton is very well and very 
pleasantly written. We were delighted with the 
liberality and candour of the Archbishop of Cashel. 
The charge is in the highest degree creditable to him. 
He must lay his account for the furious hatred of bi- 
gots, and the incessant gnawing of rats. 

There are many men who (thoroughly aware that 
the Catholic question must be ultimately carried) de- 
lay their acquiescence till the last moment, and wait 
tiJJ the moment of peril and civil war before they 
yield. That this moment is not quite so remote as 
was supposed a twelvemonth since, the events now- 
passing in the world seem to afford the strongest 
proof. The truth is, that the disaffected state of Ire- 
land is a standing premium for war with every cabinet 
in Europe which has the most distant intention of 
quarrelling with this country for any other cause. 
' If we are to go to war, let us do so when the discontents 
of Ireland are at their greatest height, before any spirit 
of concession has been shown by the British cabinet. 1 
Does any man imagine that so plain and obvious a 
principle has not been repeatedly urged on the French 
cabinet? — that the eyes of the Americans are shut 
upon the state of Ireland — and that the great and am- 
bitious republic will not, in case of war, aim a deadly 
blow at this most sensitive part of the British em- 
pire ? We should really say, that England has fully 
as much to fear from Irish fraternization with Ame- 
rica as with France. The language is the same ; the 
Americans have preceded them in the struggle ; the 
number of emigrant and rebel Irish is very great in 
America ; and all parties are sure of perfect tolera- 
tion under the protection of America. We are aston- 
ished at the madness and folly of Englishmen, who 
do not perceive that both France and America are 
only waiting for a convenient opportunity to go to 
war with this country ; and that one of the first blows 
aimed at our independence would be the invasion of 
Ireland. 

We should like to argue this matter with a regular 
tory lord, whose members voted steadily against the 
Catholic question. < I wonder that mere fear does 
not make you give up the Catholic question ! Do you 
mean to put this fine place in danger — the venison — 
the pictures — the pheasants — the cellars — the hot- 
house and the grapery? Should you like to see six 
or seven thousand French or Americans landed in Ire- 
land, and aided by a universal insurrection of the Ca- 
tholics ? Is it worth your while to run the risk of 
their success ? What evil from the possible encroach- 
ment of Catholics, by civil exertions, can equal the 
danger of such a position as this ? How can a man 
of your carriages, and horses, and hounds, think of 
putting your high fortune in such a predicament, and 
crying out, like a schoolboy or a chaplain, •' Oh, -we 
shall beat them ! we shall put the rascals down !" 
No Popery, I admit to your lordship, is a very con- 
venient cry at an election, and has answered your 
end ; but do not push the matter too far : to bring on 
a civil war, for no popery is a very foolish proceeding 



in a man who has two courses, and a remove ! As 
you value your side-board of plate, your broad riband, 
your pier glasses — if obsequious domestics and large 
rooms are dear to you — if you love ease and flattery, 
titles and coats of arms — if the labour of the French 
cook, the dedication of the expecting poet, can move 
you — if you hope for a long life of side-dishes — if you 
are not insensible to the periodical arrival of the turtle 
fleets — emancipate the Catholics ! Do it for your 
ease, do it for your insolence, do it for your safety — 
emancipate and eat, emancipate and drink — emanci- 
pate and preserve the rent-roll and tne family estate !' 

The most common excuse of the Great Shabby is, 
that the Catholics are their own enemies — that the vi- 
olence of Mr. O'Connell and Mr. Shiel have ruined 
their cause — that, but for these boisterous courses, the 
question would have been carried before this time. 
The answer to this nonsense and baseness is, that the 
very reverse is the fact. The mild and long-suffering 
may suffer forever in this world. It the Catholics had 
stood with their hands before them simpering at the 
Earls of Liverpool and the Lords Bathurst of the mo- 
ment, they would not have been emancipated till the 
year of our Lord four thousand. As long as the pa- 
tient will suffer, the cruel will kick. No treason — no 
rebellion — but as much stubborness and stoutness as 
the law permits — a thorough intimation that you know 
what is your due, and that you are determined to have 
it if you can lawfully get it. This is the conduct we 
recommend to the Irish. If they go on withholding, 
and forbearing, and hesitating whether this is the 
time for the discussion or that is the time, they will 
be laughed at for another century as fools — and kick- 
ed for another century as slaves. ' I must have my 
bill paid (says the sturdy and irritated tradesman) ; 
your master has put me off twenty times under differ- 
ent pretences. I know he is at home, and I will not 
quit the premises till I get the money.' Many a 
tradesman gets paid in this manner, who would soon 
smirk and smile himself into the gazette, if he trust- 
ed to the promises of the great. 

Can anything be so utterly childish and foolish as 
to talk of the bad taste of the Catholic leaders ? — as if, 
in a question of conferring on, or withholding impor- 
tant civil rights from seven millions of human beings, 
anything could arrest the attention of a wise man but 
the good or evil consequences of so great a measure. 
Suppose Mr. S. does smell slightly of tobacco — admit 
Mr. L. to be occasionally stimulated by rum and wa- 
ter, allow that Mr. F.was unfeeling in speaking of the 
Duke of York — what has all this nonsense to do with 
the extinction of religious hatred and the pacification 
of Ireland? Give it if it is right, refuse it if it is 
wrong. How it is asked, or how it is given or refused, 
is less than the dust of the balance. 

What is the reason why a good honest tory, living 
at ease on his possessions, is an enemy to Catholic 
emancipation? He admits the Catholic of his own 
rank to be a gentleman, and not a bad subject — and 
about theological disputes an excellent tory never 
troubles his head. Ot what importance is it to him 
whether an Irish Catholic or an Irish Protestant is a 
judge in the King's Bench at Dublin I None ; but I 
am afraid for the church of Ireland, says our alarmist. 
Why do you care so much for the church of Ireland, a 
country you never live in? — Answer — I do not care so 
much for the church of Ireland, if I was sure the Church 
of England tcould not be destroyed. — And is it for the 
Church of England alone that you fear ? — Answer- 
Not quite to that, but I am afraid we should all be lost, 
that every thing would be overturned, and that I should 
lose my rank and my estate. Here, then, we say, is a 
long series of dangers, which (it there were any 
chance of their ever taking place) would require half 
a century for their developement ; and the danger of 
losing Ireland by insurrection and invasion, which may 
happen in six months, is utterly overlooked, and for- 
gotten. And if a foreign influence should ever be fair- 
ly established in Ireland, how many hours would the 
Irish church, how many months would the English 
church, live after such an event ? How much is any 
English title worth after such an even*— any English 
family — any English estate ? We are astonished that 



CATHOLIC QUESTION. 



173 



whe brains of rich Englishmen do not fall down into 
their bellies in talking of the Catholic question — that 
they do not reason through the cardia and the pylorus 
— that all the organs ofdigestion do not become intel- 
lectual. The descendants of the proudest nobleman 
in England may become beggars in a foreign land 
from this disgraceful nonsense of the Catholic question 
— St only for the ancient females of a market town. 

What alarms us in the state of England is the un- 
certain basis on which its prosperity is placed — and 
the prodigious mass of hatred which the English gov- 
ernment continues, by its obstinate bigotry, to accu- 
mulate — eight hundred and forty millions sterling of 
debt — the revenue depending upon the demand for 
the shoes, stockings, and breeches of Europe— and 
seven millions of Catholics in a state of the greatest 
fury and exasperation. We persecute as if we did not 
owe a shilling — we spend as if we had no disaffection. 
This, by possibility, may go on ; but it is dangerous 
walking — the chance is, there will be a fall. No wise 
man should take such a course. All probabilities are 
against it. We are astonished that Lord Hertford 
and Lord Lowther, shrewd and calculating tories, do 
not see that it is nine to one against such a game. 

It is not only the event of war we fear in the milita- 
ry struggle with Ireland ; but the expense of war, 
and the expenses of the English government, are pav- 
ing the way for future revolutions. The world never 
yet saw so extravagant a government as the govern- 
ment of England. Not only is economy not practised 
— but it is despised ; and the idea of it connected with 
disaffection, Jacobinism, and Joseph Hume. Every 
rock in the ocean where a cormorant can perch is oc- 
cupied by our troops — has a governor, deputy-gover- 
nor, store-keeper, and deputy-store-keeper, — and will 
soon have an archdeacon and a bishop. Military col- 
leges, with twenty-four professors, educating seven-* 
teer. ensigns per annum, being half an ensign for each 
professor, with every species of nonsense, athletic, 
sartorial, and plumigerous. A just and necessary war 
costs this country about one hundred pounds a minute ; 
whipcord fifteen thousand pounds; red tape seven 
thousand pounds ; lace for drummers and lifers, nine- 
teen thousand pounds ; a pension to one man who has 
broken his head at the Pole ; to another who has shat- 
tered his leg at the Equator ; subsidies to Persia ; se- 
cret service money to Thibet ; an annuity to Lady 
Henry Somebody and her seven daughters — the hus- 
band being shot at some place where we never ought 
to have had any soldiers at all ; and the elder brother 
returning four members to Parliament. Such a scene 
of extravagance, corruption, and expense as must par- 
alyze the industry, and mar the fortunes, of the most 
industrious, spirited people that ever existed. 

Few men consider the historical view which will be 
taken of present events. The bubbles of last year ; 
the fishing for crowns in Vigo Bay ; the Milk Muffin 
and Crumpet Companies ; the Apple, Pear, and Plum 
Associations ; the National Gooseberry and Currant 
Company ; will all be remembered as instances of that 
partial madness to which society is occasionally ex- 
posed. What will be said of all the intolerable trash 
which is issued forth at public meetings of No Popery ? 
The follies of one century are scarcely credible in that 
which succeeds it. A grandmamma of 1827 is as wise 
as a very wise man of 1727. If the world lasts till 
1927, the grandmother of that period will be far wiser 
than the tip-top No Popery of this day. That this 
childish nonsense will have got out of the drawing- 
room, there can be no doubt. It will most probably 
have passed through the steward's room — and butler's 
pantry, into the kitchen. This is the case with 
ghosts. They no longer loll on couches and sip tea ; 
but are down on their knees scrubbing with the scul- 
lion — or stand sweating and basting with the cook. 
Mrs. Abigal turns up her nose at them, and the house- 
Keeper declares for flesh and blood, and will have 
none of their company. 

It is delicious to the persecution-fanciers to reflect 
that no general bill has passed in favour of the Pro- 
testant Dissenters. They are still disqualified from 
holding any office — and are only protected from prose- 
cution by an annual indemnity act. So that the sword 



of Damocles still hangs over them — not suspended, in- 
deed, by a thread, but by a cart-rope — still it hangs 
there an insult, if not an injury, and prevents the pain- 
ful idea from presenting itself to the mind of perfect 
toleration, and pure justice. There is the lirva of ty- 
ranny, and the skeleton of malice. Now this is all we 
presume to ask for the Catholics — admission to Parlia- 
ment, exclusion from every possible office by law, and 
annual indemnity for the breach of law. This is sure- 
ly much more agreeable to feebleness, to littleness, 
and to narrowness, than to say the Catholics are as 
free and as eligible as ourselves. 

The most intolerable circumstance of the Catholic 
dispute is, the conduct of the Dissenters. Any nnn 
may dissent from the Church of England, and preach 
against it, by paying six-pence. Almost every trades- 
man in a market town is a preacher. It must abso- 
lutely be ride and tie with them ; the butcher must 
hear the baker in the morning, and the baker listen to 
the butcher in the afternoon, or there would be no 
congregation. We have often speculated upon the pe- 
culiar trade of the preacher from his style of action. 
Some have a tying-up or parcel-packing action ; some 
strike strongly against the anvil of the pulpit ; some 
screw, some bore, some act as if they were managing 
a needle. The occupation of the preceding week can 
seldom be mistaken. In the country, three or four 
thousand Ranters are sometimes encamped, supplica- 
ting in religious platoons, or roaring psalms out of 
waggons. Now, all this freedom is very proper ; be- 
cause, though it is abused, yet in truth there is no 
other principle in religious matters, than to let men 
alone as long as they keep the peace. Yet we should 
imagine this unbounded license of Dissenters should 
teach them a little charity towards the Catholics, and 
a little respect for their religious freedom. But the 
picture of sects is this — there are twenty fettered men 
in a jail, and every one is employed in loosening his 
own fetters with one hand, and rivetting those of his 
neighbour with the other. 

' " If, then," says a minister of our own church, the Rev- 
erend John Fisher, rector of Wavenden, in this county, in 
a sermon published some years ago, and entitled "The 
Utility of the Church Establishment, and its Safety consis- 
tent with Religious Freedom" — "If, then, the Protestant 
religion could have originally worked its way in this coun- 
try against numbers, prejudices, bigotry, and interest; if, in 
times of its infancy, the power of the prince could not pre- 
vail against it ; surely, when confirmed by age, and rooted 
in the'affections of the people — when invested with author- 
ity, and in enjoyment of wealth and power — when cher- 
ished by a sovereign who holds his very throne by this sa- 
cred tenure, and whose conscientious attachment to it well 
warrants the title of Defender of the Faith—surely any at- 
tack upon it must be contemptible, any alarm of danger 
must be imaginary." '—Lord Nugent's Letter, p. 18. 

To go into a committee upon the state of the Catho- 
lic laws is to reconsider, as Lord Nugent justly obser- 
ves, passages in our domestic history, which bear date 
about 270 years ago. Now, what human plan, device, 
or invention, 270 years old, does not require reconsid- 
eration ? If a man drest as he drest 270 years ago, 
the pug-dogs in the streets would tear him to pieces. 
If he lived in the houses of 270 years ago, unrevised 
and uncorrected, he would die of rheumatism in a 
week. If he listened to the sermons of 270 years ago, 
he would perish with sadness and fatigue ; and when 
a man cannot make a coat or a cheese, for 50 years 
together, without making them better, can it be said 
that laws made in those days ol ignorance, and fram- 
ed in the fury of religious hatred, need no revision, 
and are capable of no amendment ? 

We have not the smallest partiality for the Catholic 
religion ; quite the contrary. That it should exist at 
all — that all Catholics are not converted to the Protes- 
tant religion — we consider to be a serious evil ; but 
there they are, with their spirit as strong, and their 
opinions as decided, as your own ; the Protestant part 
of the cabinet have quite given up all idea of putting 
them to death ; what remains to be done ? We all 
admit the evil ; the object is to make it as little as 
possible. One method commonly resorted to, we are 
sure, does not lessen, but increase the evil ; and that 
is, to falsify history, and deny plain and obvious facts, 



174 



WORKS OF THE REV. SIDNEY SMITH 



to the injury of the Catholics. No true friend to the 
Protestant religion, and to the Church of England, 
will ever have recourse to such disingenuous arts as 
these. 

' Our histories have not, I believe, stated what is untrue 
of Queen Mary, nor, perhaps, have they very much exag- 
gerated what is true of her; bur our arguers, whose only 
talk is of Smithfield, are generally very uncandid in what 
they ;onceal. It would appear to be little known, that the 
statutes which enabled Mary to burn those who had con- 
formed to the church of her father and brother, were Prot- 
estant statutes, declaring the common law against heresy, 
and framed by her father Henry the Eighth, and confirmed 
and acted upon by order of council of her brother Edward 
the Sixth, enabling that mild and temperate young sover- 
eign to burn divers misbelievers, by sentence of commis- 
sioners (little better, says Neale, than a Protestant Inquisi- 
tion) appointed to " examine and search after all Anabap- 
tists, Heritics, or contemners of the Book of Common Pray- 
er." It would appear to be seldom considered, that her zeal 
might very possibly have been warmed by the circumstance 
of both her chaplains having been imprisoned for their re- 
ligion, and herself arbitrarily detained, and her safety 
threatened, during the short but persecuting reign of her 
brother. The sad evidences of the violence of those days 
are by no means confined to her acts. The fagots of perse- 
cution were not kindled by Papists only, nor did they cease 
to blaze when the power of using them as instruments of 
conversion ceased to be in Popish hands. Cranmer him- 
self, in his dreadful death, met with but equal measure for 
the flames to which he had doomed several who denied the 
spiritual supremacy of Henry the Eighth; to which he had 
doomed also a Dutch Arian, in Edward the Sixth's reign ; 
and to which, with great pains and difficulty, he had per 
suaded that prince to doom another miserable enthusiast, 
Joan Bocher, for some metaphysical notions of her own on 
the divine incarnation. " So that on both sides " (says Lord 
Herbert*of Cherbury) "it grew a bloody time." Calvin 
burned Servetus at Geneva, for "discoursing concerning 
the Trinity contrary to the sense of the whole church ; and 
thereupon set forth a book wherein he giveth an account of 
his doctrine, and of whatever else had passed in this affair, 
and teacheth that the sword may be lawfully employed 
against heretics." Yet Calvin was no Papist. John Knox 
extolled in his writings, "the godly fact of James Melvil," 
the savage murder by which Cardinal Beaton was made to 
expiate his many and cruel persecutions; a murder to which, 
by the great popular eloquence of Knox, his fellow-labour 
ers in the vineyard of reformation, Lesly and Melvil, had 
been excited ; and yet John Knox, and Lesly and Melvil, 
were no papists. Henry the Eighth, whose one virtue was 
impartiality in these matters (if an impartial and evenly 
balanced persecution of all sects be a virtue,) beheaded a 
chancellor and a bishop, because having admitted his civil 
supremacy, they doubted his spiritual. Of the latter of 
them Lord Herbert says, " The pope, who suspected not 
perchance, that the bishop's end was so near, had, for more 
testimony of his favour to him as disaffection to our king, 
sent him a cardinal's hat ; but unseasonably, his head being 
off." He beheaded the Countess of Salisbury, because at 
upwards of eighty years old she wrote a letter to Cardinal 
Pole, her own son ; and he burned Barton, the " Holy Maid 
of Kent," for a prophecy of his death. He burned four 
Anabaptists in one day for opposing the doctrine of infant 
baptism ; and he burned Lambert, and Anne Ascue, and 
Belerican, and Lassells, and Adams, on another day, for 
opposing that of transubstantiation ; with many others of 
lesser note, who refused to subscribe to his Six Bloody 
Articles, as they were called, or whose opinions fell short of 
his, or exceeded them, or who abided by opinions after he 
had abandoned them ; and all this after the Reformation. 
And yet Henry the Eighth was the sovereign who first de- 
livered us from the yoke of Rome. 

< In later times, thousands of Protestant Dissenters of the 
four great sects were made to languish in loathsome prisons, 
and hundreds to perish miserably, during the reign of 
Charles the Second, under a Protestant high church govern- 
ment, who then first applied, in the prayer for the Parlia- 
ment, the epithets of " most religious and gracious," to a 
sovereign whom they knew to be profligate and unprin- 
cipled beyond example, and had reason to suspect to be a 
concealed Papist. 

< Later still, Archbishop Sharpe was sacrificed by the 
murderous enthusiasm of certain Scotch Covenanters, who 
yet appear to have sincerely believed themselves inspired 
by Heaven to this act of cold-blooded barbarous assas- 
sination. 

' On subjects like these, silence on all sides, and a mutual 
interchange of repentance, forgiveness, and oblivion, is 
wisdom. But to quote grievances on one side only, is not 
honesty.' — Lord NugenVs Letter, pp. 24—27. 

Sir Richard Birnie can only attend to the complaints 
of individuals ; but no cases of swindling are brought 



before him so atrocious as the violation of the treaty 
of Limerick, and the disappointment of those hopes, 
and the frustration of that arrangement ; which hopes, 
and which arrangements, were held out as one of the 
great arguments for the union. The chapter of Eng- 
lish fraud comes next to the chapter of English cruel- 
ty, in the history of Ireland — and both are equally dis- 
graceful. 

Nothing can be more striking than the conduct of 
the parent legislature to the legislature of the West 
Indian Islands. l We cannot leave you to yourselves 
upon these points' (says the English government) ; 
' the wealth of the planter and the commercial pros 
perity of the island are not the only points to be look- 
ed to. We must look to the general rights of humani- 
ty, and see that they are not outraged in the case of 
the poor slave. It is impossible we can be satisfied, 
till we know that he is placed in a state of progress 
and amelioration.' How beautiful is all this ! and 
how wise, and how humane and affecting are our ef- 
forts throughout Europe to put an end to the slave 
trade ? Wherever three or four negotiators are gather- 
ed together, a British diplomate appears among them, 
with some articles of kindness and pity for the poor 
negro. All is mercy and compassion, except when 
wretched Ireland is concerned. The saint who swoons 
at the lashes of the Indian slave is the encourager of 
No-Popery meetings, and the hard, bigoted, domineer- 
ing tyrant of Ireland. 

See the folly of delaying to settle a question, which 
in the end, must be settled, and, ere long, to the ad- 
vantage of the Catholics. How the price rises by de- 
lay ! This argument is extremely well put by Lord 
Nugent. 

1 1 should observe that two occasions have already been 
lost of granting these claims, coupled with what were called 
securities, such as never can return. In 1S08, the late Duke 
of Norfolk and Lord Grenville, in the one house, and Mr. 
Grattan, in the other, were authorized by the Irish Catholic 
body to propose a negative to be vested in the crown upon 
the appointment of their bishops. Mr. Perceval, the Chan- 
cellor, and the spiritual bench, did not see the importance 
of this opportunity. It was rejected ; the Irish were driven 
to despair; and in the same tomb with the question of 1808 
lies forever buried the veto. The same was the fate with 
what were called the "wings" attached to Sir Francis Bur- 
dett's bill of last year. I voted for them, not for the sake 
certainly of extending the patronage of the crown over a 
new body of clergy, nor yet for the sake of diminishing 
the popular character of elections in Ireland, but because 
Mr. O'Connell, and because some of the Protestant friends 
of the measure, who knew Ireland the best, recommended 
them ; and because I believed, from the language of some 
who supported it only on these conditions, that they offered 
the fairest chance for the measure being carried. I voted 
for them as the price of Catholic emancipation, for which 
I can scarcely contemplate any Irish price that I would not 
pay. With the same object, I would vote for them again ; 
but I shall never again have the opportunity. For these ! 
also, if they were thought of any value as securities, the > 
events of this year in Ireland have shown you that you i 
have lost forever. And the necessity of the great measure | 
becomes every day more urgent and unavoidable.' — Lord ' 
Nugent' s Letter, pp. 71, 72. 

Can any man living say that Ireland is not in a much 
more dangerous state than it was before the Catholic 
convention began to exist? — that the inflammatory 
state of that country is not becoming worse and worse ? 
— that those men whom we call demagogues and in- 
cendiaries have not produced a very considerable and ' 
alarming effect upon the Irish population ? Where is i 
this to end? But the fool lifteth up his voice in the \ 
coffee-house and sayeth, ' We shall give them a hear- 
ty thrashing : let them arise — the sooner the better — 
we will soon put them down again.' The fool sayeth 
this in the coffee-house, and the greater fool praiseth 
him. But does Lord Stowell say this ? does Mr. Peel 
say this ? does the Marquis of Hertford say this ? do 
sensible, calm, and reflecting men like these, not ad- 
mit the extreme danger of combating against invasion 
and disaffection, and this with our forces spread in ac- 
tive hostility over the whole face of the globe ? Can 
they feel this vulgar, hectoring certainty of success, 
and stupidly imagine that a thing cannot be because 
it has never yet been? because we have hitherto 
maintained our tyranny in Ireland against all Europe 



CATHOLIC QUESTION. 



175 



that we are always to maintain it ? And then, what if 
the struggle does at last end in our favour ? Is the 
loss of English lives and of English money not to be 
taken into account ? Is this the way in which a na- 
tion overwhelmed with debt, and trembling whether 
its looms and ploughs will not be overmatched by the 
looms and ploughs of the rest of Europe — is this the 
way in which such a country is to husband its re- 
sources ? Is the best blood of the land to be flung 
away in a war of hassocks and surplices ? Are cities 
to be summoned for the Thirty-nine Articles, and men 
to be led on to the charge by professors of divinity ? 
The expense of keeping such a country must be added 
to all other enormous expenses. What is really pos- 
sessed of a country so subdued ? four or five yards 
round a sentry-box, and no more. And in twenty years' 
time it is all to do over again — another war — another 
rebellion, and another enormous and ruinously expen- 
sive contest, with the same dreadful uncertainty of the 
issue I It is forgotten,- too, that a new feature has ari- 
sen in the history of this country. In all former in- 
surrections in Ireland no democratic party existed m 
England. The efforts of government were left free 
and unimpeded. But suppose a stoppage in our man- 
ufactures coincident with a rising of the Irish Catho- 
lics, when every soldier is employed in the sacred du- 
ty of Papist-hunting. Can any man contemplate such 
a state of things without horror ? Can any man say 
that he is taken by surprise for such a combination? 
Can any man say that any danger to church or state 
is comparable to this ? But for the prompt interfer- 
ence of the military in the early part of 1826, three or 
four hundred thousand manufacturers would have car- 
ried rum and destruction over the north of England, 
and over Scotland. These dangers are inseparable 
from an advanced state of manufactures — but they 
need not the addition of other and greater perils, which 
need not exist in any country too wise and too enlight- 
ened for persecution ? 

Where is the weak point in these plain arguments ? 
Is it the remoteness of the chance of foreign war? 
Alas ! we have been at war 35 minutes out of every 
hour since the peace of Utrecht. The state of war 
seems more natural to man than the state of peace ; 
and if we turn from general probabilities to the state 
of Europe — Greece to be liberated-— Turkey to be de- 
stroyed — Portugal and Spain to be made free — the 
wounded vanity of the French, the increasing arro- 
gance of the Americans, and our own philopolemical 
folly, are endless scenes of war. We believe it at. all 
times a better speculation to make ploughshares into 
swords than swords into ploughshares, "if war is cer- 
tain, we believe insurrection to be quite as certain. 
We cannot believe but that the French or the Ameri- 
cans would, in case of war, make a serious attempt 
upon Ireland, and that all Ireland would rush, tail 
foremost, into insurrection. 

A new source of disquietude and war has lately risen 
in Ireland. Our saints are evangelical people, or se- 
rious people, or by whatever name they are to be des- 
ignated, have taken the field in Ireland against the 
Pope, and are converting in the large way. Three or 
four Irish Catholic prelates take a post-chaise, and 
curse the converters and the converted. A battle roy- 
al ensues with shillelas : the policeman comes in, and, 
reckless of Lambeth or the Vatican, makes no dis- 
tinction between what is perpendicular, and what is 
hostile, but knocks down every body, and everything 
which is upright ; and so the feud ends for the day. 
We have no doubt but that these efforts will tend to 
bring things to a crisis much sooner between the par- 
ties, than the disgraceful conduct of the cabinet alone 
would do. 

'It is a charge not imputed by the laws of England, nor by 
the oaths which exclude the Catholics : for those oaths impute 
only spiritual errors. But it is imputed, which is more to the 
purpose, by those persons who approve of the excluding oaths, 
and wish them retained. But to the whole of this imputation, 
even if no other instance could be adduced, as far as a strong 
and remarkable example can prove the negative of an assump- 
- tion which there is not a single example to support — the lull and 
sufficient, and incontestible answer is Canada. Canada, which, 
until you can destroy the memory of all that now remains to you 



of your sovereignty on the North American continent, is an an- 
swer practical, memorable, difficult to be accounted for, but 
blazing as the sun itself in sight of the whole world, to the whole 
charge of divided allegiance. At your conquest of Canada, 
you found it Roman Catholic ? you had to choose for her a con- 
stitution in church and state. You were wise enough not to 
thwart public opinion. Your own conduct towards Presbyte- 
rianism in Scotland was an example for imitation; your own 
conduct towards Catholicism in Ireland was a beacon for avoid- 
ance ; and in Canada you established and endowed the religion 
of the people. Canada was your only Roman Catholic colony. 
Your other colonies revolted; they called on a Catholic power 
to support them, and they achieved their independence. Cath- 
olic Canada, with what Lord Liverpool would call her half-al- 
legiance, alone stood by you. She fought by your side against 
the interference of Catholic France. To reward and encou- 
rage her loyalty, you endowed in Canada bishops to say mass, 
and to ordain others to say mass, whom, at thai very time, 
your laws would have hanged for saying mass in England ; and 
Canada is still yours, in spite of Catholic France, in spite of 
her spiritual obedience to the pope, in spite of Lord Liver- 
pool's argument, and in spite of the independence of all the 
states that surround her. This is the only trial you have 
made. Where you allow to the Roman Catholics their religion 
undisturbed, it has proved itself to be compatible with the 
most faithful allegiance. It is only where you have placed 
allegiance and religion before them as a dilemma, that they 
have preferred (as who will say they ought not?) their religion 
to their allegiance. How then stands the imputation'? Dis- 
proved by history, disproved in all states where both religions 
co-exist, and in both hemispheres, and asserted in an exposition 
by Lord Liverpool, solemnly and repeatedly abjured by all 
Catholics, of the discipline of their church. — Lord NugenVs 
Letter, pp. 35, 36. 

Can any man who has gained permission to take off 
his strait-waistcoat, and been out of Bedlam three 
weeks, believe that the Catholic question will be set 
to rest by the conversion of the Irish Catholics to the 
Protestant religion ? The best chance of conversion 
will be gained by taking care that the point of honour 
is not against conversion. 

'We may, I think, collect from what we know of the ordinary 
feelings of men that, by admitting all to a community of bene- 
fits, we should remove a material impediment that now presents 
itself to the advances ofproselytism to our established mode of 
worship ; particularly assuming, as we do, that it is the purest, 
and that the disfranchised mode is supported only by supersti- 
tion and priestcraft. By external pressure and restraint, things 
are compacted as well in the moral as in the physical world. 
Where a sect is at spiritual variance with the established 
church, it only requires an abridgment of civil privileges to 
render it at once a political faction. Its members become in- 
stantly pledged, some from enthusiasm, some from resentment, 
and many from honourable shame, to cleave with desperate 
fondness to the suffering fortunes of an hereditary religion. Is 
this human nature, or is it not? Is it a natural or an unnatural 
feeling for the representative of an ancient Roman Catholic 
family, even if in his heart he rejected the controverted tenets 
of his early faith, to scorn an open conformity to ours, so long 
as such conformity brings with it the irremovable suspicion 
that faith and conscience may have bowed to the base hope of 
temporal advantage ? Every man must feel and act for himself: 
but, in my opinion, a good man might be put to difficulty to 
determine whether good or harm is not done by the example 
of one changing his religion to his worldly advantage, than 
good by his openly professing conformity from what we think 
error to what we think truth.' — Lord NugenVs Letter, pp. 54, 
55. 

' We will not be bullied out of the Catholic ques- 
tion.' This is a very common text, and requires some 
comment. If you mean that the sense of personal 
danger shall never prevent you from doing what you 
think right — this is a worthy and proper feeling, but 
no such motive is suspected, and no such question is 
at issue. Nobody doubts but that any English gen- 
tleman would be ready to join his No-Popery corps, 
and to do his duty to the community, if the govern- 
ment required it; but the question is, Is it worth 
while in the government to require it ? Is it for the 
general advantage that such a war should be carried 
on for such an object ? It is a question not of person- 
al valour, but of political expediency. Decide serious- 
ly if it is worth the price of civil war to exclude 
the Catholics, and act accordingly ; taking it for grant- 
ed that you possess, and that every body supposes you 
to possess, the vulgar attribute of personal courage ; 
but do not draw your sword like a fool, from the un- 
founded •epprehension of being called a coward. 
We have g;reat hopes of the Duke of Clarence. — 



176 



WORKS OF THE REV. SIDNEY SMITH. 



Whatever else he may be, he is not a bigot — not a per- 
son who thinks it necessary to show respect to his 
royal father, by prolonging the miseries and incapaci- 
ties of six millions of j^eople. If he ascends the 
throne of these realms, he must stand the fire of a few 
weeks' clamour and unpopularity. If the measure is 

Sassed by the end of May, we can promise his royal 
ighness it will utterly be forgotten before the end of 
June. Of all human nonsense, it is surely the greatest 
to talk of respect to the late king — respect to the 
memory of the Duke of York — by not voting for the 
Catholic question. Bad enough to burn widows when 
the husband dies — bad enough to burn horses, dogs, 
butlers, footmen, and coachmen, on the funeral pile of 
a Scythian warrior — but to offer up the happiness of 
seven millions of people to the memory of the dead, 
is certainly the most insane sepulchral oblation of 
which history makes mention. The best compliment 
to these deceased princes, is to remember their real 
good qualities, and to ;orget (as soon as we can forget 
it) that these good qualities were tarnished by limited 
and mistaken views of religious liberty. 

Persecuting gentlemen forget the expense of perse- 
cution ; whereas, of all luxuries, it is the most expen- 
sive. The Ranters do not cost us a farthing, because 
they are not disqualified by ranting. The Methodists 
and Unitarians are gratis. The Irish Catholics, sup- 
posing every alternate year to be war, as it has been 
for the last' century, will cost us, within these next 
twenty years, forty millions of money. There are 
20,000 soldiers there in time of peace ; in war, includ- 
ing the militia, their numbers will be doubled — and 
there must be a very formidable fleet in addition. 
Now. when the tax paper comes round, and we are to 
make a return of the greatest number of horses, bug- 
gies, ponies, dogs, cats, bullfinches, and canary birds, 
Xlc, and to be taxed accordingly, let us remember how 
well and wisely our money has been spent, and not 
repine that we have purchased, by severe taxation, 
the high and exalted pleasures of intolerance and per- 
secution. 

It is mere unsupported and unsupportable nonsense 
to talk of the exclusive disposition of the Catholics to 
persecute. The Protestants have murdered, and tor- 
tured, and laid waste as much as the Catholics. Each 
party, as it gained the upper hand, tried death as the 
remedy for heresy — both parties have tried in vain. 

A distinction is set up between civil rights, and 
political power, and applied against the Catholics : the 
real difference between these two words is, that civil 
comes from a Latin word, and political from a Greek 
one ; but if there ie any difference in their meaning, 
the Catholics do not ask for political power, but for 
eligibility to political power. The Catholics have 
never prayed, or dreamt of praying, that so many of 
the judges and king's counsel should necessarily be 
Catholics ; but that no law should exist which pre- 
vented them from becoming so, if a Protestant king 
chose to make them so. Eligibility to political power 
is a civil privilege, of which we have no more right to 
deprive any man than of any other civil privilege. 
The good of the state may require that all civil rights 
may be taken from Catholics ; but to say that eligi- 
bility to political power is not a civil right, and that 
to take it away without grave cause, would not be a 
gross act of injustice, is mere declamation. Besides, 
what is called political power, and what are called 
civil rights, are given or withholden, without the least 
reference to any principle, but by mere caprice. A 
right of voting is given — this is political power ; eligi- 
bility to the office of alderman or bank director is re- 
fused — this is a civil right : the distinction is per- 
petually violated, just as it has suited the state of 
parties for the moment And here a word or two on 
the manner of handling the question. Because some 
offices might be filled with Catholics, all would be : 
this is one topic. A second is, because there might 
be inconvenience from a Catholic king or chancellor, 
that, therefore, there would be inconvenience from 
Catholic judges or Serjeants. In talking of establish- 
ments, they always take care to blend the Irish and 
English establishments, and never to say which is 
meant, though the circumstances of both are as dif- 



ferent as possible. It is always presumed, that sects 
holding opinions contrary to the establishment, are 
hostile to the establishment ; meaning by the word 
hostile, that they are combined, or ready to combine, 
for its destruction. It is contended that the Catholics 
would not be satisfied by these concessions ; meaning, 
thereby, that many would not be so — but forgetting 
to add, that many would be quite satisfied — all more 
satisfied, and less likely to run into rebellion. It is 
urged that the mass of Catholics are indifferent to the 
question ; whereas (never mind the cause) there is 
not a Catholic plough-boy, at this moment, who is not 
ready to risk his life for it, nor a Protestant stable- 
boy, who does not give himself airs of superiority 
over any papistical cleaner of horses, who is scrubbing 
with him under the same roof. 

The Irish were quiet under the severe code of 
Queen Anne — so the half-murdered man left on the 
ground bleeding by thieves is quiet ; and he only 
moans, and cries for help as he recovers. There was 
a method which would have made the Irish still more 
quiet, and effectually have put an end to all further 
solicitation respecting the catholic question. It was 
adopted in the case of the wolves. 

They are forming societies in Ireland for the encou- 
ragement of emigration, and striving, and successfully 
striving, to push their redundant Population into Great 
Britain. Our business is to pacify Ireland — to give 
confidence to capitalists — and to keep their people 
where they are. On the day the Catholic question 
was passed, all property in Ireland would rise 20 per 
cent. 

Protestants admit that there are sectaries sitting in 
Parliament, who differ from the Church of England as 
much as the Catholics; but it is' forgotten that, ac- 
cording to the doctrine of the Church of England, the 
Unitarians are considered as condemned to eternal 
punishment in another world — and that many such 
have seats in Parliament. And can any thing be more 
preposterous (as far as doctrine has any influence in 
these matters) than that men, whom we believe to be 
singled out as objects of God's eternal vengeance, 
should have a seat in our national councils ; and that 
Catholics, whom we believe may be saved, should 
not? 

The only argument which has any appearance of 
weight, is the question of divided allegiance ; and ge- 
nerally speaking, we should say it is the argument 
which produces the greatest effect in the country at 
large. England, in this respect, is in the same state, 
at least, as the whole of Catholic Europe. Is not the 
allegiance of every French, every Spanish, and every 
Italian Catholic (who is not a Roman,) divided? His 
king is in Paris, or Madrid, or Naples, while his high- 
priest is at Rome. We speak of it as an anomaly in 
politics ; whereas, it is the state and condition of ah 
most the whole of Europe. The danger of this-divid- 
ed allegiance, they admit, is nothing, as long as it is 
confined to purely spiritual concerns ; but it may ex- 
tend itself to temporal matters, and so endanger the 
safety of the state. This danger, however, is greater 
in a. Catholic than in a Protestant country ; not only 
on account of the greater majority upon whom it 
might act ; but because there are objects in a Catholic 
country much more desirable, and attainable, than in 
a country like England, where Popery does not exist, 
or Ireland, where it is humbled and impoverished. 
Take, for instance, the freedom of the Gallican 
Church. What a temptation to the Pope to infringe 
in rich Catholic countries ! How is it possible his ho 
liness can keep his hands from picking and stealing? 
It must not be imagined that Catholicism has been 
any defence against the hostility and aggression of 
the Pope : he has cursed and excommunicated every 
Catholic state in Europe, in their turns. Let that 
eminent Protestant, Lord Bathurst, state any one in- 
stance where, for the last century, the Pope has inter- 
fered with the temporal concerns of Great Britain, 
We can mention, and his lordship will remember, in. 
numerable instances where he might have done so, if 
such were the modern habit and policy of the court of 
Rome. But the fact is, there is no'court of Rome, 
and no Pope. There is a wax- work Pope, and a wax- 



CATHOLIC QUESTION. 



m 



work court of Rome. But Popes of flesh and blood 
have long since disappeared ; and in the same way, 
those great giants of the city exist no more, but their 
truculent images are at Guildhall. We doubt if there 
is in the treasury of the Pope change for a guinea — 
we are sure there is not in his armoury one gun which 
will go off. We believe, if he attempted to bless any 
body whom Dr. Doyie cursed, or to curse any body 
whom Dr. Doyle blessed, that his blessings and curses 
would be as powerless as his artillery. Dr. Doyle* is 
the Pope of Ireland ; and the ablest ecclesiastic of 
that country will always be its pope — and that Lord 
Bathurst ought to know — most likely does know. But 
what a waste of life and time to combat such argu- 
ments ? Can my Lord Bathurst be ignorant ? Can 
any man, who has the slightest knowledge of Ireland, 
be ignorantj, that the portmanteau which sets out eve- 
ry quarter for Rome, and returns from it, is an heap 
of ecclesiastical matters, which have no more to do 
with the safety of the country, than they have to do 
with the safety of the moon — and which but for the 
respect to individual feelings, might all be published 
at Charing Cross ? Mrs. Flanagan, intimidated by 
stomach complaints, wants a dispensation for eating 
flesh. Cornelius Oh Bowel has intermarried by acci- 
dent with his grandmother; and finding that she is 
really his grandmother, his conscience is uneasy. Mr. 
Mac Tooley, the priest, is discovered to be married ; 
and to have two sons, Castor and Pollux Mac Tooley. 
Three or four schools-full of little boys have been 
cursed for going to hear a Methodist preacher. Bar- 
gains for shirts and toe-nails of deceased saints — sur- 
plices and trencher-caps blessed by the Pope. These 
are rhe fruits of double allegiance — the objects of our 
incredible folly. There is not a syllable which goes 
to or comes from the court of Rome, which, by a judi- 
cious expenditure of sixpence by the year, would not 
be open to the examination of every member of the 
cabinet. Those who use such arguments know the 
answer to them as well as we do. The real evil they 
dread is the destruction of the church of Ireland, and, 
through that, of the Church of England. To which 
we reply, that such danger must proceed from the re- 
gular proceedings of Parliament, or be effected by in- 
surrection and rebellion. The Catholics, restored to 
civil functions, would, we believe, be more likely to 
cling to the church than to Dissenters. If not, both 
Catholics and Dissenters must be utterly powerless 
against the overwhelming English interests and feel- 
ings in the house. Men are less inclined to run into 
rebellion, in proportion as they have less to complain 
of; and, of all other dangers, the greatest to the Irish 
and English church establishments, and to the Protes- 
tant faith throughout Europe, is to leave Ireland in its 
■present state of discontent. 

If the intention is to wait to the last, before concess- 
ion is made, till the French or Americans have landed, 
and the holy standard has been unfurled, we ought to 
be sure of the terms which can be obtained at such a 
crisis. This game was played in America. Commis- 
sioners were sent in one year to offer and to press 
what would have been most thankfully received the 
year before ; but they were always too late The rapid 
concessions of England were outstripped by the more 
rapid exactions of the colonies ; and the commission- 
ers returned with the melancholy history, that they 
had humbled themselves before the rebels in vain. If 
you ever mean to concede at all, do it when every con- 
cession will be received as a favour. To wait till you 
are forced to treat, is as mean in principle as it is dan- 
gerous in effect. 

Then, how many thousand Protestant Dissenters are 
there who pay a double allegiance to the king, and to 
the head of their church, who is not the king ? Is not 



* • Of this I can with great truth assure you ; and my testi 
mony, if not entitled to respect, should not be utterly disre- 
garded, that papal influence will never induce the Catholics of 
tins country either to continue tranquil, or to be disturbed, 
either to aid or to oppose the government; and that your 
lordship can contribute much more than the Pope to secure 
their allegiance, or to render them disaffected,'— Dr. Doyle's 
Letter to Lord Liverpool, 115. 



Mr. William Smith, member for Norwich, the head of 
the Unitarian Church? Is not Mr. Wilberforce the 
head of the Clapham Church ? Are there not twenty 
preachers at Leeds, who regulate all the proceedings 
of the Methodists ? The gentlemen we have mention- 
ed are eminent, and most excellent men ; but if any 
thing at all is to be apprehended from this divided al- 
legiance, we should be infinitely more afraid of some" 
Jacobinical fanatic at the head of Protestant Votaries 
— some man of such character as Lord George Gordon 
—than we should of all the efforts of th; Pope. 

As so much evil is supposed to proceed from not 
obeying the king as head of the church, it might be 
supposed to be a very active office— that the king was 
perpetually interfering with the affairs of the church — 
and that orders were in a course of emanation from 
the throne which regulated the fervour, and arranged 
the devotion, of all the members of the Church of 
England. But we really do not know what orders are 
ever given by the king to the church, except the ap- 
pointment of a fast-day once in three or four years ; — 
nor can we conceive (for appointment to bishoprics is 
out of the question) what duties there would be to 
perform, if this allegiance were paid, instead of being 
withholden. Supremacy appears to us to be a mere 
name, without exercise of power — and allegiance to be 
a duty, without any performance annexed. If any one 
will say what ought to be done which is not done, on 
account of this divided allegiance, we shall better un- 
derstand the magnitude of the evil. Till then, we 
shall consider it as a lucky Protestant phrase, good to 
look at, like the mottos and ornaments on cake, — but 
not fit to be eaten. 

Nothing can be more unfair than to expect, in an an- 
cient church like that of the Catholics, the same 
uniformity as in churches which have not existed for 
more than two or three centuries. The coats and 
waistcoats of the reign of Henry VIII. bear some re- 
semblance to the same garments of the present day ; 
but, as you recede, you get to the skins of wild beasts, 
or the fleeces of sheep, for the garments of savages. — 
In the same way, it is extremely difficult for a church, 
which has to do with the counsels of barbarous ages, 
not to be detected in some discrepancy of opinion ; — 
while in younger churches, every thing is fair and 
fresh, and of modern date and figure ; and it is not the 
custom among theologians to own their church in the 
wrong. l No religion can stand, if men, without re- 
gard to their God, and with regard only to controversy, 
shall take out of the rubbish of antiquity the obsolete 
and quaint follies of the sectarians, and affront the ma- 
jesty of the Almighty with the impudent catalogue of 
their devices ; and it is a strong argument against the 
prescriptive system, that it helps to continue this 
shocking contest. Theologian against theologian, — 
polemic against polemic, until the two madmen defame 
their common parent, and expose their common reli- 
gion. 7 — Grattan's Speech onthe Catholic Question, 1805. 

A good-natured and well-conditioned person has 
pleasure in keeping and distributing any tiling that is 
good. If he detects any thing with superior flavour, 
he presses and invites, and is not easy till others par- 
ticipate ; and so it is with political and religious 
freedom. It is a pleasure to possess it, and a plea- 
sure to communicate it to others. There is something 
shocking in the greedy, growling, guzzling monopoly 
of such a blessing. 

France is no longer a nation of atheists ; and there- 
fore, a great cause of offence to the Irish Roman Ca- 
tholic clergy is removed. Navigation by steam ren- 
ders all shores more accessible. The union among 
Catholics is consolidated ; all the dangers of Ireland 
are redoubled : every thing seems tending to an event 
fatal to England— fatal (whatever Catholics may fool- 
ishly imagine) to Ireland — and which will subject 
them both to the dominion of France. 

Formerly a poor man might be removed from a 
parish if there was the slightest danger of his be- 
coming chargeable ; a hole in his coat or breeches 
excited suspicion. The churchwardens said, ' He has 
cost us nothing, but he may cost us something ; and 
we must not live even in the apprehension of evil.' 
All this is changed ; and the law now says, « Wait till 



178 



WORKS OF THE REV. SIDNEY SMITH. 



you are hurt ; time enough to meet the evil when it 
comes ; you have no right to do a certain evil to 
others, to prevent an uncertain evil to yourselves.' 
The Catholics, however, are told that what they do 
ask is objected to, from the fear of what they may 
*sk ; that they must do without that which is rea- 
sonable, for fear they should ask what is unreasonable. 
1 I would give you a penny (says the miser to the beg- 
gar) , if I was quite sure you would not ask me for 
half a crown.' 

1 Nothing, I am told, is now so common on the continent as 
to hear our Irish policy discussed. Till of late the extent of 
the disabilities was but little understood, and less regarded, 
partly because, having less liberty themselves, foreigners 
could not appreciate the deprivations, and partly because the 
pre-eminence of England was not so decided as to draw the 
eyes of the world on all parts of our system. It was scarcely 
credited that England, that knight-errant abroad, should play 
the exclusionist at home ; that everywhere else she should 
declaim against oppression, but contemplate it without emo- 
tion at her doors. That her armies should march, and her 
orators philippize, and her poets sing against continental ty- 
ranny, and yet that laws should remain extant, and principles 
be operative within our gates, which ajre a bitter satire on our 
philanthropy, and a melancholy negation of our professions. 
Our sentiments have been so lofty, our deportment to foreign- 
ers so haughty, and we have set up such liberty and such 
morals, that no one could suppose that we were hypocrites. 
Still less could it be foreseen that a great moralist, called 
Joseph Surface, kept a " little milliner" behind the scenes, we 
too should be found out at length in taking the diversion of 
private tyranny after the most approved models for that 
amusement.' — Letter to Lord Milton, pp. 50, 51. 

We sincerely hope — we firmly believe — it will never 
happen ; but if it were to happen, why cannot Eng- 
land be just as happy with Ireland being Catholic, as 
it is with Scotland being Presbyterian ? Has not the 
Church of England lived side by side with the Kirk 
without crossing or jostling, for these last hundred 
years ? Have the Presbyterian members entered into 
any conspiracy for mincing bishoprics and deaneries 
into synods and presbyteries ? And is not the Church 
of England tenfold more rich and more strong than 
when the separation took place ? But however this 
may be, the real danger, even to the Church of Ire 
land, as we have before often remarked, is the refusal 
of Catholic emancipation. 

It would seem, from the frenzy of many worthy 
Protestants, whenever the name of Catholic is men- 
tioned, that the greatest possible diversity of religious 
opinions existed between the Catholic and the Pro- 
testant — that they were as different as fish and flesh 
— as alkali and acid — as cow and cart-horse ; whereas 
it is quite clear, that there are many Protestant sects 
whose difference from each other is much more mark- 
ed, both in church discipline and in tenets of faith, 
than that of Protestants and Catholics. We maintain 
that Lambeth, in these two points, is quite as near to 
the Vatican as it is to the Kirk — if not much nearer. 

Instead of lamenting the power of the priests over 
the lower orders of the Irish, we ought to congratulate 
ourselves that any influence can affect and control 
them. Is the tiger less formidable in the forest than 
when he has been caught and taught to obey a voice 
and tremble at a hand? But we over-rate the power 
of the priest, if we suppose that the upper orders are to 
encounter all the dangers of treason and rebellion, to 
confer the revenues of the Protestant church upon the 
Catholic clergy. If the influence of the Catholic clergy 
upon men of rank and education be so unbounded, why 
cannot the French and Italian clergy recover their 
possessions, or acquire an equivalent for them ? They 
are starving in the full enjoyment of an influence 
which places (as we think) all the wealth and power 
of the country at their feet — an influence which, in our 
opinion, overpowers avarice, fear, ambition, and is 
the master of every passion which brings on change 
and movement in the Protestant world. 

We conclude with a few words of advice to the dif- 
ferent opponents of the Catholic question. 

To the No-Popery Fool. 
You are made use of by men who laugh af you, and 
despise you for your folly and ignorance ; and who, 



the moment it suits their purpose, will consent to 
emancipation of the Catholics, and leave you to roar 
and bellow No Popery ! to vacancy and the moon. 

To the No-Popery Rogue. 
A shameful and scandalous game, to sport with the 
serious interests of the country, in order to gain some 
increase of public power ! 

To the Honest No-Popery People. 

We respect you very sincerely — but are astonished 
at your existence. 

To the Base. 

Sweet children of turpitude, beware ! the old anti- 
popery people are fast perishing away. Take heed 
that you are not surprised by an emancipatng king, or 
an emancipating administration. Leave a locus pceni- 
tentice ! — prepare a place for retreat — get ready your 
equivocations and denials. The dreadful day may yet 
come, when liberality may lead to place and power. 
We understand these matters here. It is the safest to 
be moderately base — to be flexible in shame, and to 
be always ready for what is generous, good, and just, 
when any thing is to be gained by virtue. 

To the Catholics. 

i Wait. Do not add to your miseries by a mad and 
desperate rebellion. Persevere in civil exertions, and 
concede all you can concede. All great alterations in 
human affairs are produced by compromise 



(Edinburgh Review, 



Par. M. Neckar 



NECKAR'S LAST VIEWS. 
1803.) 

Demieres Vues de Politiques, et de Finance. 
An. 10, 1802. 

If power could be measured by territory, or count- 
ed by population, the inveteracy, and the disproportion 
which exists between France and England, must occa- 
sion to every friend of the latter country the most se- 
rious and well-founded apprehensions. Fortunately 
however for us, the question of power is not only what 
is the amount of population ? but, how is that popula- 
tion governed? How far is a confidence in the stability 
of political institutions established by an experience 
of their wisdom ? Are the various interests of society 
adjusted and protected by a system of laws thoroughly 
tried, gradually ameliorated, and purely administered ? 
What is the degree of general prosperity evinced by 
that most perfect of all criteria, general credit? 
These are the considerations to which an enlightened 
politician, who speculates on the future destiny of na- 
tions, will direct his attention, more than to the august 
and imposing exterior of territorial dominion, or to 
those brilliant moments, when a nation, under the in- 
fluence of great passions, rises above its neighbours, 
and above itself, in military renown. 

If it be visionary to suppose the grandeur and safety 
of the two nations as compatible and co-existent, we 
have the important (though the cruel) consolation of 
reflecting, that the French have yet to put together 
the very elements of a civil and political constitution ; 
that they have to experience all the danger and ail 
the inconvenience which results from the rashness 
and the imperfect views of legislators, who have 
every thing to conjecture, and every thing to create ; 
that they must submit to the contusion of repeated 
change, or the greater evil of obstinate perseverance 
in error; that they must live for a century in that 
state of perilous uncertainty in which every revolu. 
tionized nation remains, before rational liberty be- 
comes feeling and habit, as well as law, and is written 
in the hearts of men as plainly as in the letter of the 
statute ; and that the opportunity of beginning this 
immense edifice of human happiness is so far from 
being presented to them at present, that it is ex- 
tremely problematical whether or not they are to be 
bandied from one vulgar usurper to another, and re- 
main for a century subjugated to the rigour of a mUi 



NECKAR'S LAST VIEWS. 



179 



tary government, at once the scorn and the scourge of 
Europe.* 

To the more pleasing supposition, that the First 
Consul will make use of his power to give his country 
a free constitution, we are indebted for the work of 
M. Neckar now before us, a work of which good tem- 
per is the characteristic excellence : it every where 
preserves that cool impartiality which it is so diffi- 
cult to retain in the discussion of subjects connected 
with recent and important events ; modestly proposes 
the results of reflection ; and, neither deceived nor 
wearied by theories, examines the best of all that 
mankind have said or done for the attainment of 
rational liberty. 

The principal object of M. Neckar's book is to ex- 
amine this question, l An opportunity of election sup- 
posed, and her present circumstances considered — 
what is the best form of government which France is 
capable of receiving V and he answers his own query, 
by giving the preference to a Republic One and Indi- 
visible. 
The work is divided into four parts. 

1. An examination of the present constitution of 
France. 

2. On the best form of a Republic One and Indi- 
visible. 

3. On the best form of a Monarchical Government. 

4. Thoughts upon Finance. 

From the misfortune which has hitherto attended 
all discussions of present constitutions in France, M. 
Neckar hfis not escaped. The subject has proved too 
rapid for the author ; and its existence has ceased be- 
fore its properties were examined. This part of the 
work, therefore, we shall entirely pass over ; because, 
to discuss a mere name, is an idle waste of time ; and 
no man pretends that the present constitution of 
France can, with propriety, be considered as any 
thing more. We shall proceed to a description of 
that form of a republican government which appears 
to M. Neckar best calculated to promote the happi- 
ness of that country. 

Every department is to be divided into five parts, 
each of which is to send one member. Upon the eve 
of an election, all persons paying 200 livres of govern- 
ment taxes in direct contribution, are to assemble to- 
gether, and choose 100 members from their own 
number, who form what M. Neckar calls a chamber 
of indication. This chamber of indication is to pre- 
sent five candidates, of whom the people are to elect 
one ; and the right of voting in this latter election is 
given to every body engaged in a wholesale or retail 
business ; to all superintendents of manufactures and 
trades ; to all commissioned and non-commissioned 
officers and soldiers who have received their dis- 
charge ; and to all citizens paying, in direct contribu- 
tion, to the amount of twelve livres. Votes are not 
to be given in one spot, but before the chief magistrate 
of each commune where the voter resides, and there 
inserted in registers; from a comparison of which, 
the successful candidate is to be determined. The 
municipal officers are to enjoy the right of recommend- 
ing one of these candidates to the people, who are free 
to adopt their recommendation or not, as they may 
think proper. The right of voting is confined to qual- 
ified single men of twenty-five years of age : married 
men of the same description may vote at any age. 

To this plan of election we cannot help thinking 
there are many great and insuperable objections. The 
first and infallible consequence of it would be, a devo- 
lution of the whole elective franchise upon the cham- 
ber of indication, and a complete exclusion of the peo- 
ple from any share in the privilege : for the chamber 
bound to return five candidates, would take care to 
return four out of the five so thoroughly objectionable, 
that the people would be compelled to choose the fifth. 
Such has been the constant effect of all elections so 
constituted in Great Britain, where the power of con- 
ferring the office has always been found to be vested in 
those who named the candidates, not in those who se- 
lected an individual from the candidates named. 

* All this is, unfortunately, as true now as it was when 
written thirty years ago. 



But if such were not the consequences of a double 
election; and if it were so well constituted, as to re- 
tain that character which the legislature meant to 
impress upon it. there are other reasons which would 
induce us to pronounce it a very pernicious institution. 
The only foundation of political liberty is the spirit of 
the people ; and the only circumstance which makes 
a lively impression upon their senses, and powerfully 
reminds them of their importance, their power, and 
their rights, is the periodical choice of their represen- 
tatives. How easily that spirit may be totally extin- 
guished, and of the degree of abject fear and slavery 
to which the human race may be reduced for ages, 
every man of reflection is sufficiently aware : and he 
knows that the preservation of that feeling is, of all 
other objects of political science, the most delicate 
and the most difficult. It appears to us, that a people 
who did not choose their representatives, but only 
those who chose their representatives, would very soon 
become indifferent to their elections altogether. To 
deprive them of their power of nominating their own 
candidate, would be still worse. The eagerness of 
the people to vote, is kept alive by their occasional 
expulsion of a candidate who has rendered himself 
objectionable, or the adoption of one who knows how 
to render himself agreeable to them. They are proud 
of being solicited personally by a man of family or 
wealth. The uproar even, and the confusion and the cla- 
mour of a popular election in England, have their use ; 
they give a stamp to the names, Liberty, Constitution, 
and People ; they infuse sentiments which nothing but 
violent passions and gross objects of sense could in- 
fuse ; and which would never exist, perhaps, if the 
sober constituents were to sneak, one by one, into a 
notary's office to deliver their votes for a representa- 
tive, or were to form the first link in that long chain 
of causes and effects, which, in this compound kind of 
elections, ends with choosing a member of parliament. 

« Above all things (says M. Neckar) languor is the most 
deadly to a republican government : for when such a politi- 
cal association is animated neither by a kind of instinctive 
affection for its beauty, nor by the continual homage of re- 
flection to the happy union of order and liberty, the public 
spirit is half lost, and with it the republic. The rapid bril- 
liancy of despotism is preferred to a mere complicated ma- 
chine, from which every symptom of life and organization 
is fled.' 

Sickness, absence, and nonage, would (even under 
the supposition of universal suffrage) reduce the vo- 
ters of any country to one fourth of its population. A 
qualification much lower than that of the payment of 
twelve livres in direct contribution, would reduce that 
fourth one half, and leave the voters in France three 
millions and a half, which, divided by 600, gives be- 
tween five and six thousand constituents for each re- 
presentative ; a number, not amounting to a third part 
of the voters for many counties in England, and which 
certainly is not so unwieldy as to make it necessary to 
have recourse to the complex mechanism of double 
elections. Besides, too, if it could be believed that 
the peril were considerable, of gathering men together 
in such masses, we have no hesitation in saying, that 
it would be infinitely preferable to thin their numbers, 
by increasing the value of the qualification, than to 
obviate the apprehended bad effects, by complicating 
the system of election. 

M. Neckar (much as he has seen and observed; is 
clearly deficient in that kind of experience which is 
gained by living under free governments ; he mistakes 
the riots of a free, for the insurrections of an enslaved 
people ; and appears to be impressed with the most 
tremendous notions of an English election. The differ- 
ence is, that the tranquillity of an arbitrary govern- 
ment is rarely disturbed, but from the most serious 
provocations, not to be expiated by any ordinary 
vengeance. The excesses of a free people are less im- 
portant, because their resentments are less serious ; — 
and they can commit a great deal of apparent disorder 
with very little real mischief. An English mob, which 
to a foreigner, might convey the belief of an impend- 
ing massacre, is often contented by the demolition of 
a few windows. 

The idea of diminishing the number of sonstituents, 



180 



WORKS OF THE REV. SIDNEY SMITH. 



rather by extending the period of nonage to twenty- 
five years, than by increasing the value of the qualifi- 
cation, appears to us to be new and ingenious. No 
person considers himself as so completely deprived of 
a share in the government, who is to enjoy it when he 
becomes older, as he would do, were that privilege 
deferred till he became richer ; — time comes to all, — 
wealth to few. 

This assembly of representatives, as M. Neckar has 
constituted it, appears to us to be in extreme, danger 
of turning out' to be a mere collection of country gen- 
demen. Every thing is determined by territorial ex- 
tent and population ; and as the voters in town must, 
in any single division, be almost always inferior to the 
country voters, the candidates will be returned in virtue 
of large landed property ; and that infinite advantage 
which is derived to a popular assembly, from the 
variety of characters of which it is composed, would 
be entirely lost under the system of M. Neckar. The 
sea-ports, the universities, the great commercial 
towns, should all have their separate organs in the 
parliament of a great country. There should be some 
means of bringing in active, able, young men, who 
would submit lo the labour of business, from the stim- 
ulus of honour and wealth. Others should be there, 
expressly to speak the sentiments, and defend the in- 
terests of the executive. Every popular assembly 
must be grossly imperfect, that is not composed of 
such heterogeneous materials as these. Our own par- 
liament may perhaps contain within itself too many of 
that species of representatives, who could never have 
arrived at the dignity under a pure and perfect system 
of election ; but, for all the practical purposes of gov- 
ernment, amidst a great majority fairly elected by the 
people, we should always wish to see a certain uumber 
of the legislative body representing interests very 
distinct from those of the people. 

The legislative part of his constitution M. Neckar 
manages in the following manner. There are two 
councils, the great and the little. The great council 
is composed of five members from each department, — 
elected in the manner we have just described, and 
amounting to the number of six hundred. The assem- 
bly is re-elected every five years. No qualification* 
of property is necessary to its members, who receive 
each a salary of 12,000 livres. No one is eligible to 
the assembly before the age of twenty-five years. — 
The little national council consists of one hundred 
members, or from that number to one hundred and 
twenty ; one for each department. It is re-elected 
every ten years ; its members must be thirty years of 
age ; and they receive the same salary as the members 
of the great council. For the election of the little 
council, each of the five chambers of indication, in 
every departmant, gives in the name of one candidate ; 
and, from the five so named, the same voters who 
choose the great council select one. 

The municipal officers enjoy, in this election, the 
«-ame right of recommending one of the candidates to 
the people ; a privilege which they would certainly 
exercise indirectly, without a law, wherever they 
could exercise it with any effect, and the influence of 
which the sanction of the law would at all times rather 
diminish than increase. 

The grand national council commences all delibera- 
tions which concern public order, and the interest of 
the state, with the exception of those only which be- 
long to finance. Nevertheless, the executive and the 
little council have it in their power to propose any law 
for the consideration of the grand council. When a 
law has passed the two councils, and received the 
sanction of the executive senate, it becomes binding 
upon the people. If the executive senate disapprove 
of any law presented to them for their adoption, they 
are to send it back to the two councils for reconsidera- 
tion ; but if it pass these two bodies again, with the 
approbation of two-thirds of the members of each as- 
sembly, the executive has no longer the power of 
withholding its assent. All measures of finance are to 
initiate with government. 

* Nothing can be more absurd than our qualifications for 
parliament : it is nothing but a foolish and expensive lie on 
parchment. 



We believe M. Neckar to be right iu his idea of not 
exacting any qualification of property in his legisla- 
tive assemblies. When men are left to choose their 
own governors, they are guided in their choice by some 
one of those motives which has always commanded 
their homage and admiration : — if they do not choose 
wealth, they choose birth or talents, or military fame 
and of all these species of pre-eminence, a large pop- 
ular assembly should be constituted. In England, the 
laws, requiring that members of parliament should be 
possessed of certain property, are (except in the in- 
stance of members for counties) practically repealed. 

In the salaries of the members of the two councils, 
with the exception of the expense, there is, perhaps, 
no great balance of good or harm. To some men it 
would be an inducement to become senators ; to oth- 
ers, induced by more honorable motives, it^, would af- 
ford the means of supporting that situation without 
disgrace. Twenty- five years of age is certainly too 
late a period for the members of the great council. Of 
what astonishing displays of eloquence and talent 
should we have been deprived in this country under 
the adoption of a similar rule ! 

The institution of two assemblies constitutes a check 
upon the passion and precipitation by which the reso- 
lutions of any single popular assembly may occasion- 
ally be governed. The chances, that one will correct 
the other, do not depend solely upon their dividuality, 
but upon the different ingredients of which they are 
composed, and that difference of system and spirit, 
which results from a difference of conformation. Per- 
haps M. Neckar has not sufficiently attended to this 
consideration. The difference between his two assem- 
blies is not very material; and the same popular fury 
which marked the proceedings of the one, would not be 
very sure of meeting with an adequate corrective in the 
dignified coolness and wholesome gravity of the other. 

All power which is tacitly allowed to devolve upon 
the executive part of a government, from the expe- 
rience that it is most conveniently placed there, is 
both safer, and less likely to be complained of, than 
that which is conferred upon it by law. If M. Neckar 
had placed some agents of the executive in the great 
council, all measures of finance would, in fact, have 
originated in them, without any exclusive right to such 
initiation ; but the right of initiation, from M. Neck- 
ar's contrivance, is likely to excite that discontent in 
the people, which alone can render it dangerous and 
objectionable. 

In this plan of a republic, every thing seems to de- 
pend upon the purity and the moderation of its govern- 
ors. The executive has no connection with the great 
council ; the members of the great council have no 
motive of hope, or interest, to consult the wishes of 
the executive. The assembly, which is to give exam- 
ple to the nation, and enjoy its confidence, is compos- 
ed of six hundred men, whose passions have no other 
control than that pure love of the public, which it is 
hoped they may possess, and that cool investigation of 
interests, which it is hoped they may pursue. 

Of the effects of such a constitution, every thing 
must be conjectured ; for experience enables us to make 
no assertion respecting it. There is only one govern- 
ment in the modern world, which, from the effects it 
has produced, and the time it has endured, can with 
justice be called good and free. Its constitution, in 
books, contains the description of a legislative assem- 
bly, similar to that of M. Neckar's. Happily, perhaps, 
for the people, the share they have really enjoyed in its 
election, is much less ample than that allotted to them 
in this republic of the closet. How long a really pop- 
ular assembly would tolerate any rival and co-ex- 
isting power in the state — for what period the feeble 
executive, and the untitled, unblazoned peers of a re- 
public, could stand against it— whether any institu- 
tions, compatible with the essence and meaning of a 
republic, could prevent it from absorbing all the dig- 
nity, the popularity, and the power of the state, — are 
questions that we leave for the resolution of wiser 
heads ; with the sincerest joy, that we have only a 
theoretical interest in stating them.* 
The executive senate is to consist of seven ; and the 
* That interest is at present not quite so theoretical as it 



NECKAR'S LAST VIEWS. 



181 



right of presenting the candidates, and selecting from 
the candidates alternately from one assembly to the 
other, i. e. on a vacancy, the great council present 
three candidates to the little council, who select one 
from that number ; and on the next vacancy, by the 
inversion of this process, the little council present and 
the great council select ; and so alternately. The 
members of the executive must be thirty-five years of 
age. Their measures are determined by a majority. 
The president, called the Consul, has a casting vote : 
his salary is fixed at 300,000 livres ; that of all the 
other senators at 60,000 livres. The office of con- 
sul is annual. Every senator enjoys it in his turn. 
Every year one senator goes out, unless re-elected ; 
which he may be once, and even twice, if he unites 
three fourths of the votes of each council in his favour. 
The executive shall name to all civil* and military of- 
fices, except to mayors and municipalities. Political 
negociations, and connections with foreign countries, 
fall under the direction of the executive. Declarations 
of war or peace, when presented by the executive to 
the legislative body, are to be adopted, the first by a 
majority of three-fifths, the last by a simple majority. 
The parade, honours, and ceremonies of the executive, 
devolve upon the consul alone. The members of the 
senate, upon going out of office, become members of 
the little council to the number of seven. Upon the 
vacation of an eighth senator, the oldest ex-senator 
in the little council resigns his seat to make room for 
him. All responsibility rests upon the consul alone, 
who has a right to stop the proceedings of a majority 
of the executive senate, by declaring them unconstitu- 
tional ; and if the majority persevere, in spite of this 
declaration, the dispute is referred to and decided by a 
secret committee of the little council. 

M. Neckar takes along with him the same mistake 
through the whole of his constitution, by conferring 
the choice of candidates on one body, and the election 
of the member on another : so that though the alterna- 
tion would take place between the two councils, it 
would turn out to be in an order directly opposite to 
that which was intended. 

We perfectly acquiesce in the reasons M. Neckar 
has alleged for the preference given to an executive 
constituted of many individuals, rather than of one. 
The prize of supreme power is too tempting to admit 
of fair play in the game of ambition ; and it is wise to 
lessen its value by dividing it : at least it is wise to 
do so under a form of government that cannot admit 
the better expedient of rendering the executive hered- 
itary ; an expedient (gross and absurd as it seems to 
be) the best calculated, perhaps, to obviate the effects 
of ambition upon the stability of governments, by 
narrowing the field on which it acts, and the object for 
which it contends. The Americans have determined 
otherwise, and adopted an elective presidency : but 
there are innumerable circumstances, as M. Neckar 
very justly observes, which render the example of 
America inapplicable to other governments. America 
is a federative republic, and the extensive jurisdiction 
of the individual States exonerates the president from 
so great a portion of the cares of domestic govern- 
ment, that he may almost be considered as a mere 
minister of foreign affairs. America presents such an 
immediate, and such a seducing species of provision to 
all its inhabitants, that it has no idle discontented 
populace ; its population amounts to six millions, and 
It is not condensed in such masses as the population of 
Europe. After all, an experiment of twenty years is 
never to be cited in politics ; nothing can be built upon 
such a slender inference. Even if America were to 
remain stationary, she might find that she had pre- 
sented too fascinating and irresistible an object to hu- 
man ambition : of course that peril is increased by eve- 
ry augmentation of a people, who are hastening on, with 
rapid and. irresistible pace, to the highest eminences 
of human grandeur. Some contest for power there 
must be in every free state : but the contest for vica- 
rial and deputed power, as it implies the presence of a 
moderator and master, is more prudent than the 
struggle for that which is original and supreme. 

The difficulty of reconciling the responsibility of the 
executive with its dignity, M. Neckar foresees ; and 



states, but does not remedy. An irresponsible execu- 
tive, the jealousy of a republic would never tolerate ; 
and its amenability to punishment, by degrading it in 
the eyes of the people, diminishes its power. 

All the leading features of civil liberty are copied 
from the constitution of this country, with hardly any 
variation. 

Having thus finished his project of a republic, Mr. 
Neckar proposes the government of this country as 
the best model of a temperate and hereditary monar- 
chy ; pointing out such alterations in it as the genius 
of the French people, the particular circumstances in 
which they are placed, or the abuses which have crept 
into our policy, may require. From one or the other 
of these motives he re-establishes the salique law:* 
forms his elections after the same manner as that pre. 
viously described in his scheme of a republic ; and 
excludes the clergy from the house of peers. This 
latter assembly M. Neckar composes of 250 heredita- 
ry peers chosen from the best families in France, and 
of 50 assistant peers enjoying that dignity for life only, 
and nominated by the crown. The number of heredi- 
tary peers is limited as above ; the peerage goes only 
in the male line ; and upon each peer is perpetually 
entailed landed property to the amount of 30,000 
livres. This partial creation of peers for life only, ap- 
pears to remedy a very material defect in the English 
constitution. An hereditary legislative aristocracy 
not only adds to the dignity of the throne, and estab- 
lishes that gradation of ranks which is, perhaps, abso- 
lutely necessary to its security, but it transacts a con- 
siderable share of the business of the nation, as well 
in the framing of laws as in the discharge of its juridi- 
cal functions. But men of rank and wealth, though 
they are interested by a splendid debate, will not sub- 
mit to the drudgery of business, much less can they be 
supposed conversant in all the niceties of law ques- 
tions. It is therefore necessary to add to their num- 
ber a certain portion of novi homines, men of establish- 
ed character for talents, and upon whom the previous 
tenour of their lives has necessarily impressed the 
habits of business. The evil of this is, that the title 
descends to their posterity, without the talents and 
the utility that procured it ; and the dignity of the 
peerage is impaired by the increase of its numbers : 
not only so, but as the reward of military, as well as 
the earnest of civil services, and as the annuity com- 
monly granted with it is only for one or two lives, we 
are in some danger of seeing a race of nobles wholly 
dependent upon the crown for their support, and sac- 
rificing their political freedom to their necessities. 
These" evils are effectually, as it should seem, obviat- 
ed by the creation of a certain] number of peers for 
life only ; and the increase of power which it seems to 
give to the Crown, is very fairly counteracted by the 
exclusion of the episcopacy, and the limitation of the 
hereditary peerage. As the weight of business in the 
upper house would principally devolve upon the crea- 
ted peers, and as they would hardly arrive at that dig- 
nity without having previously acquired great civil or 
military reputation, the consideration they would enjoy 
would be little inferior to that of the other part of the 
aristocracy. When the noblesse of nature are fairly 
opposed to the noblesse created by political institu- 
tions, there is little fear that the former should suffer 
by the comparison. 

If the clergy are suffered to sit in the lower house, 
the exclusion of the episcopacy from the upper house 
is of less importance : but, in some part of the legisla- 
tive bodies, the interests of the church ought unques- 
tionably to be represented. This consideration M. 
Neckar wholly passes over.J 



* A most sensible and valuable law, banishing gallantry 
and chivalry from cabinets, and preventing the amiable an- 
tics of grave statesmen. 

t The most useless and offensive tumour in the body po- 
litic, is the titled son of a great man whose merit has placed 
him in the peerage. The name, face, and perhaps the pen- 
sion remain. The daemon is gone ; or there is a slight fla- 
vour from the cask, but it is empty. 

t The parochial clergy are as much unrepresented in the 
English Parliament as they are in the Parliament of Brobdig- 
nag. The Bishops make just what laws they please, and the 



182 



WORKS OF THE REV. SIDNEY SMITH. 



Though this gentleman considers an hereditary mo- 
narchy as preferable in the abstract, he deems it im- 
possible that such a government could be established 
in France, under her present circumstances, from the 
impracticability of establishing with it an hereditary 
aristocracy ; because the property, and the force of 
opinion, which constituted their real power, are no 
more, and cannot be restored. Though we entirely 
agree with M. Neckar, that an hereditary aristocracy 
is a necessary part of a temperate monarchy, and that 
the latter must exist upon the base of the former, or 
not at all — we are by no means converts to the very 
decided opinion he has expressed of the impossibility 
of restoring them both to France. 

We are surprised that M. Neckar should attempt to 
build any strong argument upon the durability of 
opinions in nations that are about to undergo, or that 
have recently undergone, great political changes. 
What opinion was there in favour of a republic in 
17S0 ? Or against it in 1794 ? Or, what opinion is 
there now in favour of it in 1802 ? Is not the tide of 
opinions, at this moment, in France, setting back with 
a strength equal to its flow ? and is there not reason 
to presume, that, for some time to come, their ancient 
institutions may be adored with as much fury as they 
were destroyed? If opinion can revive in favour of 
kings (and M. Neckar allows it may,) why not in fa- 
vour of nobles? It is true their property is in the 
hands of other persons ; and the whole of that species 
of proprietors will exert themselves to the utmost to 
prevent a restoration so pernicious to their interests. 
The obstacle certainly is of a very formidable nature. 
But why this weight of property, so weak a weapon 
of defence to its ancient, should be deemed so irresist- 
ible in the hands of its present possessors, we are at a 
loss to conceive ; unless, indeed, it be supposed, that 
antiquity of possession diminishes the sense of right 
and the vigour of retention ; and that men will strug- 
gle harder to keep what they have acquired only yes- 
terday, than that which they have possessed, by them- 
selves or their ancestors, for six centuries. 

In France the inferiority of the price of revolutiona- 
ry lands to others, is immense. Of the former species, 
church land is considerably dearer than the forfeited 
estates of emigrants. Whence the difference of price, 
but from the estimated difference of security? Can any 
fact display more strongly the state of public opinion 
with regard to the probability of a future restoration 
of these estates, either partial or total ? and can any 
circumstance facilitate the execution of such a project 
more than the general belief that it will be executed ? 
M. Neckar allows, that the impediments to the forma- 
tion of a republic are very serious ; but thinks they 
would all yield to the talents and activity of Buona- 
parte, if he were to dedicate himself to the superin- 
tendence of such a government during the period of its 
infancy : of course, therefore, he is to suppose the 
same power dedicated to the formation of an heredi- 
tary monarchy : or his parallel of difficulties is unjust, 
and his preference irrational. Buonaparte could repre- 
sent the person of a monarch, during his life, as well 
as he could represent the executive of a republic ; and 
if he could overcome the turbulence of electors, to 
whom freedom was new. he could appease the jealousy 
that his generals would entertain of the returning no- 
bles. Indeed, without such powerful intervention, this 
latter objection does not appear to us to be by any 
means insuperable. If the history of our own resto- 
ration were to be acted over again in France, and roy- 
alty and aristocracy brought back by the military suc- 
cessor of Buonaparte, it certainly could not be done 
without a very liberal distribution of favours among the 
great leaders of the army. 

Jealousy of the executive is one feature of a repub- 
lic ; in consequence, that government is clogged with 
a multiplicity of safeguards and restrictions, which 
render it unfit for investigating complicated details, 
and managing extensive relations with vigour, consis- 
tency, and despatch. A republic, therefore, is better 
fitted for a little state than a large one. 

bearing they may have on the happiness of the clergy at 
large, never for one moment comes into the serious con- 
sideration of Parliament. 



A love of equality is another very strong principle 
in a republic ; therefore it does not tolerate hereditary 
honour or wealth ; and all the effect produced upon the 
minds of the people by this factitious power is lost, 
and the government weakened : but, in proportion as 
the government is less able to command, the people 
should be more willing to obey ; therefore a republic 
is better suited to a moral than an immoral people. 

A people who have recently experienced great evils 
from the privileged orders and from monarchs, love 
republican forms so much, that the warmth of their 
inclination supplies, in some degree, the defect of their 
institutions. Immediately, therefore, upon the destruc- 
tion of despotism, a republic may be preferable to a lim- 
ited monarchy. 

And yet, though narrowness of territory, purity of 
morals, and recent escape from despotism, appear to 
be the circumstances which most strongly recommend 
a republic, M. Neckar proposes it to the most numer- 
ous and the most profligate people in Europe, who are 
disgusted with the very name of liberty, from the in- 
credible evils they have suffered in pursuit of it. 

Whatever be the species of free government adopt- 
ed by France, she can adopt none without the greatest 
peril. The miserable dilemma in which men living 
under bad governments are placed, is, that, without a 
radical revolution, they may never be able to gain lib- 
erty at all ; and, with it, the attainment of liberty ap- 
pears to be attended with almost insuperable difficul- 
ties. To call upon a nation, on a sudden, totally des- 
titute of such knowledge and experience, to perform 
all the manifold functions of a free constitution, is to 
entrust valuable, delicate, and abstruse mechanism, to 
the rudest skill and the grossest ignorance. Public 
acts may confer liberty ; but experience only can 
teach a people to use it ; and, till they have gained 
that experience, they are liable to tumult, to jealousy, 
to collision of powers, and to every evil to which men 
are exposed, who are desirous of preserving a great 
good, without knowing how to set about it. In an old 
established system of liberty, like our own, the en- 
croachments which one department of the state makes 
on any other, are slow, and hardly intentional ; the 
political feelings and the constitutional knowledge 
which every Englishman possesses, create a public 
voice, which tends to secure the tranquillity of the 
whole. Amid the crude sentiments and new-born pre- 
cedents of sudden liberty, the crown might destroy 
the Commons, or the Commons the crown, almost be- 
fore the people had formed any opinion of the nature 
of their contention. A nation grown free in a single 
day, is a child born with the limbs and the vigour of a 
man, who would take a drawn sword for his rattle, and 
set the house in a blaze, that he might chuckle over 
the splendour. 

Why can factious eloquence produce such limited 
effects in this country? Partly because we are accus- 
tomed to it, and know how to appreciate it. We are 
acquainted with popular assemblies ; and the language 
of our Parliament produces the effect it ought upon 
public opinion, because long experience enables us to 
conjecture the real motives by which men are actuat- 
ed ; to separate the vehemence of party spirit from 
the language of principle and truth ; and to discover 
whom we can trust, and whom we cannot. The want 
of all this, and of much more than this, must retard, 
for a very long period, the practical enjoyment of li 
berty in France, and present very serious obstacles to 
her prosperity ; obstacles little dreamed of by men 
who seem to measure the happiness and future gran 
deur of France by degrees of longitude and latitude 
and who believe she might acquire liberty with as 
much facility as she could acquire Switzerland or Na- 
ples. 

M. Neckar's observations on the finances of France, 
and on finance in general, are useful, entertaining, and 
not above the capacity of every reader. France, he 
says, at the beginning of 1781, had 438 millions of re- 
venue ; and, at present 540 millions. The state paid, 
in 1781, about 215 millions in pensions, the interest of 
perpetual debts, and debts for life. It pays, at pre- 
sent, 80 millions in interests and pensions ; and owes 
about 12 millions for anticipations on the public reve- 



TABLEAU DES ETATS DANOIS. 



183 



nue. A considerable share of the increase of the reve- 
nue is raised upon the conquered countries ; and the 
people are liberated from tithes, corvees, and the tax 
on salt. This, certainly, is a magnificent picture of 
finance. The best informed people at Pans, who 
would be very glad to consider it as a copy from life, 
dare not contend that it is so. At least, we sincerely 
ask pardon of M. Neckar, if our information as to this 
point be not correct : but we believe he is generally 
considered to have been misled by the public financial 
reports. 

In addition to the obvious causes which keep the 
interest of money so high in France, M. Neckar states 
one which we shall present to our readers : — 

' There is one means for the establishment of credit,' he 
says, ' equally important with the others which I have stated 
— a sentiment of respect for morals, sufficiently diffused to 
overawe the government, and intimidate it from treating 
with bad faith any solemn engagements contracted in the 
name of the state. It is this respect for morals which 
seems at present to have disappeared ; a respect which the 
Revolution has destroyed, and which is unquestionably one 
of the firmest supports of national faith.? 



The terrorists of this country are so extremely 
alarmed at the power of Buonaparte, that they ascribe 
to him resources which M. Neckar very justly ob- 
serves to be incompatible — despotism and credit. 
Now, clearly, if he is so omnipotent in France as he is 
represented to be, there is an end of all credit ; for no- 
body will trust him whom nobody can compel to pay ; 
and if he establishes a credit, he loses all that tempo- 
rary vigour which is derived from a revolutionary gov- 
ernment. Either the despotism or credit of France 
directed against this country would be highly formid- 
able ; but, both together, can never be directed at the 
same time. 

In this part of his work, M. Neckar very justly points 
out one of the most capital defects of Mr. Pitt's ad- 
ministration ; who always supposed that the power of 
France was to cease with her credit, and measured the 
period of her existence by the depreciation of her 
assignats. Whereas, France was never more power- 
ful than when she was totally unable to borrow a sin- 
gle shilling in the whole circumference of Europe, and 
when her assignats were not worth the paper on which 
they were stamped. 

Such are the principal contents of M. Neckar's very 
respectable work. Whether, in the course of that 
work, his political notions appear to be derived from 
a successful study of the passions of mankind, and 
whether his plan tor the establishment of a republican 
government in France, for the ninth or tenth time, 
evinces a more sanguine, or a more sagacious mind, 
than the rest of the world, we would rather our rea- 
ders should decide for themselves, than expose our- 
selves to any imputation of arrogance, by deciding for 
them. But when we consider the pacific and impartial 
disposition which characterizes the Last Views on 
Politics and Finance, the serene benevolence which it 
always displays, and the pure morals which it always 
inculcates, we cannot help entertaining a high respect 
for its venerable author, and feeling a fervent wish, 
that the last views of every public man may proceed 
from a heart as upright, and be directed to objects as 
good. 



CATTEAU, TABLEAU DES ETATS DANOIS. 
(Edinburgh Review, 1803.) 

Tableaux des Etats Danoig. Par Jean Pierre Catteau. 3 tomes. 
1802. a Paris. 

The object of this book is to exhibit a picture of 
the kingdom of Denmark, under all its social rela- 
tions, of politics, statistics, science, morals, manners, 
and every thing which can influence its character and 
importance, as a free and independent collection of 
human beings. 

This book is, upon the whole, executed with great 
diligence and good sense. Some subjects of import- 
ance are passed over, indeed, with too much haste ; 
but if the publication had exceeded its present magni- 
tude, it would soon have degenerated into a mere book 



of reference, impossible to be read, and fit only, like 
a dictionary, for the purposes of occasional appeal : 
It would not have been a picture presenting us with 
an interesting epitome of the whole ; but a typogra- 
phical plan, detailing with minute and fatiguing pre- 
cision, every trifling circumstance, and every subordi- 
nate feature. We should be far from objecting to a 
much more extended and elaborate performance than 
the present ; because those who read, and those who 
write, are now so numerous, that there is room enough 
for varieties and modifications of the same subject : 
but information of this nature, conveyed in a form 
and in a size adapted to continuous reading, gains in 
surface what it loses in depth, — and gives general 
notions to many, though it cannot afford all the know 
ledge which a few have it in their power to acquire, 
from the habits of more patient labour, and more pro 
found research. 

This work, though written at a period when enthu- 
siasm or disgust had thrown men's minds off their 
balance, is remarkable, upon the whole, for sobriety 
and moderation. The observations, though seldom 
either strictly ingenious or profound, are just, tem- 
perate, and always benevolent. We are so far from 
perceiving any thing like extravagance in Mr. Catteau, 
that we are inclined to think he is occasionally too 
cautious for the interests of truth ; that he manages 
the court of Denmark with too much delicacy ; and 
exposes, by distant and scarcely perceptible touches, 
that which it was his duty to have brought out boldly 
and strongly. The most disagreeable circumstance in 
the style of the book is, the author's compliance with 
that irresistible avidity of his country to declaim upon 
common-place subjects. He goes on, mingling buco- 
lic details and sentimental effusions, melting and mea- 
suring, crying and calculating, in a manner which is 
very bad, if it is poetry, and worse if it is prose. In 
speaking of the mode of cultivating potatoes, he can- 
not avoid calling the potato a modest vegetable : and 
when he comes to the exportation of horses from the 
duchy of Holstein, we learn that l these animals are 
dragged from the bosom of their peaceable and modest 
country, to hear, in foreign regions, the sound of the 
warlike trumpet ; to carry the combatant amid the 
hostile ranks ; to increase the eclat of some pompous 
procession ; or drag, in gilded car, some favourite of 
fortune.' 

We are sorry to be compelled to notice these un- 
timely effusions, especially as they may lead to a sus- 
picion of the fidelity of the work; of which fidelity, 
from actual examination of many of the authorities 
referred to, we have not the most remote doubt. Mr. 
Catteau is to be depended upon as securely as any 
writer, going over such various and extensive ground, 
can ever be depended upon. He is occasionally guilty 
of some trifling inaccuracies ; but what he advances is 
commonly derived from the most indisputable autho- 
rities ; and he has condensed together a mass of in- 
formation, which will render his book the most accessi- 
ble and valuable road of knowledge, to those who are 
desirous of making any researches respecting the king- 
dom of Denmark. 

Denmark, since the days of piracy, has hardly been 
heard out of the Baltic. Margaret, by the union of 
Calmar, laid the foundation of a monarchy, which 
(could it have been preserved by hands as strong as 
those which created it) would have exercised a power- 
ful influence upon the destinies of Europe, and have 
strangled, perhaps, in the cradle, the infant force of 
Russia. Denmark, reduced to her ancient bounds by 
the patriotism and talents of Gustavas Vasa, has never 
since been able to emerge into notice by her own na- 
tural resources, or the genius of her ministers and her 
monarchs. During that period, Sweden has more than 
once threatened to give laws to Europe ; and, headed 
by Charles and Gustavus, has broke out into chivalrous 
enterprises, with an heroic valour, which merited 
wiser objects, and greater ultimate success. The spi- 
rit of the Danish nation has, for the last two or three 
centuries, been as little carried to literature or to sci- 
ence, as to war. They have written as little as they 
have done. With the exception of Tycho Brahe and 
a volume of sheJ there is hardly a Danish book, or 



184 



WORKS OF THE REV. SIDNEY SMITH. 



a Danish writer, known five miles from the Great Belt. 
It is not sufficient to say, that there are many authors 
read and admired in Denmark ; there are none that 
have passed the Sound, none that have had energy 
enough to force themselves into the circulation of Eu- 
rope, to extort universal admiration, and live, with- 
out the aid of municipal praise, and local approba- 
tion. From the period, however, of the first of the 
Bernstorfis, Denmark has made a great spring, and 
has advanced more within the last twenty or thirty 
years, than for the three preceding centuries. The 
peasants are now emancipated ; the laws of com- 
merce, foreign and interior, are simplified and ex- 
panded ; the transport of corn and cattle is made free ; 
a considerable degree of liberty is granted to the 
press : and slavery is to cease this verjr year in their 
West Indian possessions. If Ernest Bernstorff was 
the author of some less considerable measures, they 
are to be attributed more to the times, than to the 
defects of his understanding, or of his heart. To this 
great minister succeeded the favourite Struensee, and 
to him Ove Guildberg ; the first, with views of im- 

{ movements, not destitute of liberality or genius, but 
ittle guided by judgment, or marked by moderation ; 
the latter, devoid of that energy and firmness which 
were necessary to execute the good he intended. In 
1788, when the king became incapable of business, and 
the crown-prince assumed the government, Count An- 
drew Bernstorff, nephew of Ernest, was called to the 
ministry; and, while some nations were shrinking 
from the very name of innovation, and others over- 
turning every establishment, and violating every prin- 
ciple, Bernstorff steadily pursued, and ultimately 
effected, the gradual and bloodless amelioration of 
his country. His name will ever form a splendid 
epoch in the History of Denmark. The spirit of eco- 
nomical research and improvement which emanated 
from him still remains ; while the personal character 
of the prince of Denmark, and the zeal with which he 
seconded the projects of his favourite minister, seem 
to afford a guarantee for the continuation of the same 
system of administration. 

In his analysis of the present state of Denmark, Mr. 
Catteau, after a slight historical sketch of that coun- 
try, divides his subject into sixteen sections. 

1. Geographical and physical qualities of the Danish 
territory : 2. Form of Government : 3. Administra- 
tion : 4. Institutions relative to government and admi- 
nistration : 5. Civil and criminal laws, and judiciary 
institutions : 6. Military system, land army, and ma- 
rine : 7. Finance : 8. Population : 9. Productive in- 
dustry, comprehending agriculture, the fisheries, and 
the extraction of mineral substances : 10. Manufactur- 
ing industry: 11. Commerce, interior and exterior, in- 
cluding the state of the great roads, the canals of na- 
vigation, the maritime insurances, the bank, &c. &c. : 
12. Establishments of charity and public utility : 13. 
Religion: 14. Education: 15. Language, character, 
manners, and customs: 16. Sciences and arts. — This 
division we shall follow. 

From the southern limits of Holstein to the southern 
extremity of Norway, the Danish dominions extend to 
300 miles* in length, and are, upon an average, from 
about 50 to 60 in breadth ; the whole forms an area of 
about 8000 square miles. The western coast of Jut- 
land, from Riba to Lemvig, is principally alluvial, and 
presents much greater advantages to the cultivator 
than he has yet drawn from it. The eastern coast is 
also extremely favourable to vegetation. A sandy 
and barren ridge stretching from north to south, be- 
tween the two coasts is unfavourable to every species 
of culture, and hardly capable of supporting the wild 
and stunted shrubs which languish upon its surface. 
Towards the north, where the Jutland peninsula ter- 
minates in the Baltic, every thing assumes an aspect 

* The mile alluded to here, and through the whole of the 
book, is the Danish mile, 15 to a degree, or 4000 toises in round 
numbers : the ancient mile of Norway is much more considera- 
ble. It may be as well to mention here, that the Danes reckon 
their money by rixdollars, marks, and schellings. A rixdollar 
contains 6 marks, and a mark 16 schellings ; 20 schellings are 
equal to one livre ; consequently, the pound sterling is equal 
u> 4 r. 4 m. 14 sen., or nearly 5 rixdollars. 



of barrenness and desolation. It is Arabia, without 
its sun or its verdant islands ; but not without its tem- 
pests or sands, which sometimes overwhelm what lit- 
tle feeble agriculture they may encounter, and convert 
the habitual wretchedness of the Jutlanders into se- 
vere and cruel misfortune. The Danish government 
has attempted to remedy this evil, in some measure, 
by encouraging the cultivation of those kind of shrubs 
which grow on the sea-shore, and by their roots give 
tenacity and aggregation to the sand. The Elymus 
Armaria, though found to be the most useful for that 
purpose, is still inadequate to the prevention of the 
calamity.* 

The Danish isles are of a green and pleasant aspect. 
The hills are turfed up to the top, or covered with 
trees ; the valleys animated by the passage of clear 
streams ; and the whole strikingly contrasted with the 
savage sterility, or imposing grandeur, of the scenes 
on the opposite coast of Jutland. All the seas of 
Denmark are well stored with fish ; and a vast number 
of deep friths and inlets afford a cheap and valuable 
communication with the interior of the couutry. 

The Danish rivers are neither numerous nor consi- 
derable. The climate, generally speakiug, is moist 
and subject to thick fogs, which almost obscure the 
horizon. Upon a mean of twenty-six years, it has 
rained for a hundred and thirty days every year, and 
thundered for thirteen. Their summer begins with 
June, and ends with September. A calm serene sky, 
and an atmosphere free from vapours, are very rarely 
the lot of the inhabitants of Denmark ; but the humi- 
dity with which the air is impregnated is highly fa- 
vourable to vegetation; and all kinds of corn and 
grass are cultivated there with success. To the 
south of Denmark are the countries of Sleswick and 
Holstein. Nature has divided these countries into two 
parts ; the one of which is called Geetsland, the other 
Marschland. Geetsland is the elevated ground situa- 
ted along the Baltic. The soil resembles that of Den- 
mark. The division of Marschland forms a band or 
stripe, which extends from the Elbe to the frontiers of 
Jutland, an alluvium gained and preserved from the 
sea, by a labour which, though vigilant and severe, is 
repaid by the most ample profits. The sea, however, 
in all these alluvial countries, seldom forgets his ori- 
ginal rights. Marschland, in the midst of all its tran- 
quillity, fat, and silence, was invaded by this element 
in the year 1634, with the loss of whole villiages, ma- 
ny thousands of horned cattle, and 1500 human be- 
ings. 

Nature is as wild and grand in Norway as she is 
productive in Marschland. Cataracts amid the dark 
pines ; the eternal snow on the mountains ; seas that 
bid adieu to the land, and stretch out to the end of the 
world ; an endless succession of the great and the ter- 
rible. — leave, the eye and the mind without repose. 
The climate of Norway is extremely favourable to the 
longevity of the human race, and sufficiently so to the 
life of inany animals domesticated by man. The 
horses are of good breed; the horned cattle excel- 
lent, though small. Crops of grain are extremely 
precarious, and often perish before they come to ma- 
turity.* 

In 1660, the very year in which this happier coun- 
try was laying the foundation of rational liberty by 
the wise restrictions imposed upon its returning 
monarch, the people of Denmark, by a solemn act, 
surrendered their natural rights into the hands of 
their sovereign, endowed him with absolute power, 
and, in express words, declared him, for all his politi- 
cal acts, only accountable to Him to whom all kings 
and governors are accountable. This revolution, simi- 
lar to that effected by the king and people at Stock- 
holm in 1772, was not a change from liberty to slave- 

* There is a Danish work, by Professor Viborg, upon those 
plants Which grow in sand. It has been very actively distri- 
buted in Jutland, by the Danish administration, and might be 
of considerable service in Norfolk, and other parts of Great 
Britain. 

* We shall take little notice of Iceland in this review, from 
the attention we mean to pay to that subject in the review of 
'Voyage en Iceland, fait par ordre de saMajeste Danoise' 5 
vols. 1802. 



TABLEAU DES ETATS DANOIS. 



185 



2; but from a worse sort of slavery to a better ; from 
e control of an insolent and venal senate, to that of 
one man : it was a change which simplified their de- 
gradation, and, by lessening the number of their ty- 
rants, put their servitude more out of sight. There 
ceased immediately to be an arbitrary monarch in 
every parisn, and the distance of the oppressor, either 
operated as a diminution of the oppression, or was 
thought to do so. The same spirit, to be sure, which 
urged them to victory over one evil, might have led 
them on a little farther to the subjugation of both ; 
and they might have limited the king, by the same 
powers which enabled them to dissolve the senate. 
But Europe, at that period, knew no more of liberty 
than of galvanism ; and the peasants of Denmark no 
more dreamt of becoming free than the inhabitants of 
Paris do at this moment. 

? At present, Denmark is in theory one of the most 
arbitrary governments on the face of the earth. It has 
remained so ever since the revolution to which we 
have just alluded ; in all which period the Danes have 
not, by any important act of rebellion, evinced an im- 
patience of their yoke, or any sense, that the enor- 
mous power delegated to their monarch has been im- 
properly exercised. In fact, the Danish government 
enjoys great reputation for its forbearance and mild- 
ness ; and sanctifies, in a certain degree, its execrable 
constitution by the moderation with which it is admi- 
nistered. We regret extremely that Mr. Catteau has 
given us, upon this curious subject of the Danish go- 
vernment, such a timid and sterile dissertation. Many 
governments are despotic in law, which are not de- 
spotic in fact ; not because they are restrained by their 
own moderation, but because, in spite of their theo- 
retical omnipotence, they are compelled, in many 
important points, to respect either public opinion, or 
the opinion of other balancing powers, which, without 
the express recognition of law, have gradually sprung 
up in the state. Russia and Imperial Rome had its 
praetorian guards. Turkey has its uhlema. Public 
opinion almost always makes some exceptions to its 
blind and slavish submission ; and in bowing its neck 
to the foot of a sultan, stipulates how hard he shall 
tread. The very fact of enjoying a mild government 
for a century and a halt, must, in their own estimation, 
have given the Danes a sort of right to a mild govern- 
ment. Ancient possession is a good title in all cases ; 
and the king of Denmark may have completely lost 
the power of doing many just and many unjust actions, 
from never having exercised it in particular instances. 
What he has not done for so long a period, he may not 
dare to do now ; and he may in vain produce consti- 
tutional parchment, abrogated by the general feelings 
of those whom they were intended to control. Instead 
of any information of this kind, the author of the Tab- 
leau has given us at full length the constitutional act 
of 1660, and has afforded us no other knowledge than 
we could procure from the most vulgar histories ; as 
if state papers were the best place to look for consti- 
tutions, and as if the rights of king and people were 
really adjusted, by the form and solemnity of covenant 
and pacts j by oaths of allegiance, or oaths of corona- 
tion. 

The king has his privy counsel, to which he names 
whom he pleases, with the exception of the heir-ap- 
parent, and the princes of the blood, who sit there of 
right. It is customary, also, that the heads of colleges 
should sit there. These colleges are the offices" in 
which the various business of the state is carried on. 
The chancelry of Denmark interprets all laws which 
concern privileges in litigation, and the different de- 
grees of authority belonging to various public bodies. 
It watches over the interests of church and poor : is- 
sues patents, edicts, grants, letters of naturalization, 
legitimacy, and nobility. The archives of the state 
are also under its custody. The German chancelry 
has the same powers and privileges in Sleswick and 
Holstein, which are fiefs of the empire. There is a 
college for foreign affairs ; two colleges of finance ; and 
a college of economy and commerce ; which, divided 
into four parts, directs its attention to four objects : 1, 
Manufacturing Industry; 2, Commerce; 3, Produc- 
tions ; 4, Possessions in the East Indies. All projects 



and speculations, relative U> any of these objects, are 
referred to this college ; and every encouragement 
given to the prosecution of such as it may approve. 
There are two other colleges, which respectively ma- 
nage the army and navy. The total number is nme. 

The court of Denmark is on a footing of great sim- 
plicity. The pomp introduced by Christian IV., who 
modelled his establishments after those of Louis XIV., 
has been laid aside, and a degree of economy adopted, 
much more congenial to the manners of the people, 
and the resources of the country. The hereditary 
nobility of Denmark may be divided into those of the 
ancient, those of the modern fiefs, and the personal 
nobility. The first class are only distinguished from 
the second, by the more extensive privileges annexed 
to their fiefs ; as it has been the policy of the court of 
Denmark, in latter times, not to grant such immunities 
to the possessors of noble lands as had been accorded 
to them at earlier periods. Both of these classes, how- 
ever, derive their nobility from their estates, which 
are inalienable, and descend according to the laws of 
primogeniture. In the third class, nobility derives 
from the person, and not from the estate. To prevent 
the iemale noblesse from marrying beneath their rank, 
and to preserve the dignity of their order, nine or ten 
Protestant nunneries have been from time to time en- 
dowed, in each of which about twelve noble women 
are accommodated, who, not bound by any vow, 
find in these societies an economical and elegant re- 
tirement. The nobility of Norway have no fiefs. The 
nobility of Holstein and Sleswick derive their nobility 
from their fiefs, and are possessed of very extensive 
privileges. Every thing which concerns their com- 
mon interest is discussed in a convention held periodi- 
cally in the town of Keil ; during the vacations of the 
convention, there is a permanent deputation resident in 
the same town. Interests so well watched by the no- 
bles themselves, are necessarily respected by the court 
of Denmark. The same institution of free nunneries 
for the female nobility prevails in these provinces. 
Societies of this sort might perhaps be extended to 
other classes, and to other countries, with some utility. 
The only obj iction to a nunnery is, that those who 
change their mind cannot change their situation. That 
a number of unmarried females should collect together 
into one mass, and subject themselves to some few 
rules of convenience, is a system which might afford 
great resources and accommodation to a number of 
helpless individals, without proving injurious to the 
community ; unless, indeed, any very timid statesman 
shall be alarmed at the progress of celibacy, and ima- 
gine that the increase and multiplication of the human 
race may become a mere antiquated habit. 

The lowest courts in Denmark are composed of a 
judge and a secretary, both chosen by the landed pro- 
prietors within the jurisdiction, but confirmed by the 
king, in whose name all their proceedings are carried 
on. These courts have their sessions once a week in 
Denmark, and are attended by four or five burgesses or 
farmers, in the capacity of assessors, who occasionally 
give their advice upon subjects of which their particu- 
lar experience may entitle them to judge. From this 
jurisdiction there is appeal to a higher court, held every 
month in different places in Denmark, by judges paid 
by the crown. The last appeal for Norway and Den- 
mark is to the Hoieste Rett, or supreme court, fixed at 
Copenhagen, which is occupied for nine months in the 
year, and composed half of noble, half of plebeian 
judges. This is the only tribunal in which the advo- 
cates plead viva voce; in all the others, litigation is 
carried on by writing. The king takes no cognizance 
of pecuniary suits determined by this court, but re- 
serves to himself a revision of all its sentences which 
affect the fife or honour of the subject. It has always 
been the policy of the court of Denmark to render jus- 
tice as cheap as possible. We would have been glad 
to have learnt from Mr. Catteau, whether or not the 
cheapness of justice operates as an encouragement to 
litigation ; and whether (which we believe- is most 
commonly the case) the quality of Danish justice is 
not in the ratio of the price. But this gentleman, as 
we have before remarked, is so taken up by the formal 
part of institutions, that he has neither leisure nor in- 



186 



WORKS OF THE REV. SIDNEY SMITH. 



clination to say much of their spirit. The Tribunal of 
Conciliation, established since 1795, is composed of the 
most intelligent and respectable men in the vicinage, 
and its sessions are private. It is competent to deter- 
mine upon a great number of civil questions ; and if 
both parties agree to the arrangement proposed by the 
court, its decree is registered, and has legal authority. 
If the parties cannot be brought to agreement by the 
amicable interference of the mediators, they are at full 
liberty to prosecute their suit in a court of justice. All 
the proceedings of the Tribunal of Conciliation are upon 
unstamped paper, and they cannot be protracted longer 
than fifteen days in the country, and eight days in the 
towns, unless both parties consent to a longer delay. 
The expenses, which do not exceed three shillings, are 
not payable, but in case of reconciliation. During the 
three years preceding this institution, there came be- 
fore the courts of law, 25,521 causes ; and, for the three 
years following, 9653, making the astonishing difference 
of fifteen thousand eight hundred and sixty-three law- 
suits. The idea of this court was taken from the 
Dutch, among whom it likewise produced the most 
happy effects. And when we consider what an im- 
portant point it is, that there should be time for dispu- 
tants to cool ; the strong probability there is, that four 
or five impartial men from the vicinage will take a 
right view of the case, and the reluctance that any man 
must feel to embark his reputation and property in op- 
position to their opinion, we cannot entertain a doubt 
of the beauty and importance of the invention. It is 
hardly possible that it should be bad justice which sat- 
isfies both parties, and this species of mediation has no 
validity but upon such condition. It is curious, too, to 
remark, how much the progress of rancour obstructs 
the natural sense of justice ; it appears that plaintiff 
and defendant were both satisfied in 15,868 causes : if 
all these causes had come on to a regular hearing, and 
the parties been inflamed by the expense and the pub- 
licity of the quarrel, we doubt if there would have been 
one single man out of the whole number who would 
have acknowledged that his cause was justly given 
against him. 

There are some provisions in the cnminal law of 
Denmark, for the personal liberty of the subject, 
which cannot be of much importance, so long as the 
dispensing power is vested in the crown ; however, 
though they are not much, they are better than noth- 
ing ; and have probably some effect in offences mere- 
ly criminal, where the passions and interests of the 
governors do not interfere. Mr. Catteau considers the 
law which admits the accused to bail, upon finding 
proper security, to be unjust, because the poor cannot 
avail themselves of it. But this is bad reasoning ; for 
every country has a right to impose such restrictions 
and liens upon the accused, that they shall be forth- 
coming for trial ; at the same time, those restrictions 
are not to be more severe than the necessity of the 
case requires. The primary and most obvious meth- 
od of security is imprisonment. Whoever can point 
out any other method of effecting the same object, 
less oppressive to himself and as satisfactory to the 
justice of the country, has a right to require that it be 
adopted ; whoever cannot, must remain in prison. It 
is a principle that should never be lost sight of, that 
no other vexation should be imposed upon him than 
what is absolutely necessary for the purposes of fu- 
ture investigation. The imprisonment of a poor man, 
because he cannot find bail, is not a gratuitous vexa- 
tion, but a necessary severity ; justified only, because 
no other, nor milder mode of security can, in that par- 
ticular instance, be produced. 

Inquisitorial and penal torture is, in some instances, 
allowed by the laws of Denmark : the former, after 
having been abolished, was re-established in 1771. 
The corporations have been gradually and covertly 
attacked in Denmark, as they have been in Great Bri- 
tain. The peasants, who had before been attached to 
the soil, were gradually enfranchised between 1788 
and 1800 ; so that, on the first day of the latter year, 
there did not remain a single slave in the Danish do- 
minions ; or, to speak more correctly, slavery was 
equalized among all ranks of people. We need not 
descant ou the immense importance of this revolution ; 



and if Mr. Catteau had been of the same opinion, we 
should have been spared two pages of very bad decla- 
mation ; beginning, in the true French style, with " oh 
toi," and going on with what might be expected to 
follow such a beginning. 

The great mass of territorial proprietors in Denmark 
are the signiors, possessing fiefs with very extensive 
privileges and valuable exemptions from taxes. Ma- 
ny persons hold lands under these proprietors, with in- 
terests in the land of very different descriptions. 
There are some cultivators who possess freeholds, but 
the number of these is very inconsiderable. The 
greater number of farmers are what the French call 
Metayers, put in by the landlord, furnished with stock 
and seed at his expense, and repaying him in product, 
labour, or any other manner agreed on in the contract. 
This is the first, or lowest stage of tenantry, and is 
the surest sign of a poor country. The feudal system 
never took root very deeply in Norway : the greater 
part of the lands are freehold, and cultivated by their 
owners. Those which are held under the few privi- 
leged fiefs which still exist in Norway, are subjected 
to less galling conditions than farms of a similar te- 
nure in Denmark. Marriage is a mere civil contract 
among the privileged orders ; the presence of a priest 
is necessary for its celebration among the lower or- 
ders. In every large town, there are two public tu- 
tors appointed, who, in conjunction with the magis- 
trates, watch over the interests of wards, at the same 
time that they occupy themselves with the care of the 
education of children within the limits of their juris- 
diction. Natural children are perhaps more favour- 
ed in Denmark than in any other kingdom in Europe ; 
they have half the portion which the law allots to le- 
gitimate children, and the whole if there are no legit- 
imate. 

A very curious circumstance took j)lace in the king- 
dom of Denmark, in the middle of the last century, re- 
lative to the infliction of capital punishment upon mal- 
efactors. They were attended from the prison to the 
place of execution by priests, accompanied by a very 
numerous procession, singing psalms, &c. &c, : which 
ended, a long discourse was addressed by the priest to 
the culprit, who was hung as soon as he had heard it. 
This spectacle, and all the pious cares bestowed upon 
the criminals, so far seduced the imaginations of the 
people, that many of them committed murder purpose 
ly to enjoy such inestimable advantages, and the gov- 
ernment was positively obliged to make hanging dull 
as well as deadly, before it ceased to be an object of 
popular ambition. 

In 1796, the Danish land forces amounted to 74,654. 
of which 50,880 were militia.* Amongst the troops 
on the Norway establishment, is a regiment of ska- 
ters. The pay of a colonel in the Danish service is a- 
bout 1 740 rixdollarspe?- annum, with some perquisites; 
that of a private six schellings a day. The entry into 
the Danish states from the German side is naturally 
strong. The passage between Lubeck and Hamburg 
is only eight miles, and the country intersected by 
marshes, rivers, and lakes. The straits of the Baltic 
afford considerable security to the Danish isles ; and 
there are very few points in which an army could pen- 
etrate through the Norway mountains to overrun that 
country. The principal fortresses of Norway are Co- 
penhagen, Rendsbhurg, Gluchstadt, and Frederick- 
shall. In 1801, the Danish navy consisted of 3 ships 
of 80 guns, 12 of 74, 2 of 70, 3 of 64, and 2 of 60 ; 4 fri- 
gates of 40, 3 of 36, 3 of 24, and a number of small 
vessels : in all, 22 of the line, and 10 frigates.f 

The revenues of Denmark are derived from the in- 
terest of a capital formed by the sale of crown lands ; 
from a share in the tithes ; from the rights of fishing 

* The militia is not embodied in regiments by itself, but di- 
vided among the various regiments of the line. 

t In 1791, the Swedish army amounted to 47,000 men, regu- 
lars and militia; their nrvy to not more than 16 ships of the 
line: before the war it was about equal to the Danish navy. 
The author of Voyage des deux Francais places the regular 
troops of Russia at 250,000 men, exclusive of guards and garri- 
sons ; and her navy, as it existed in 1791, at 30 frigates, and 50 
sail of the line, of which 8 were of 110 guns. This is a brief 
picture of forces of the Baltic powers. 



TABLEAU DES ETATS DANOIS. 



187 



and hunting let to farm ; from licenses granted to the 
farmers to distil their own spirits ; from the mint, post, 
turnpikes, lotteries, and the passage of the Sound. 
About the year 1740, the number of vessels which 
passed the Sound both ways, was annually from 4000 
to 5000; in 1752, the number of 6000 was considered 
as very extraordinary. They have increased since in 
the following ratio : — 

1770 - - 7,736 

1777 - - 9,047 

1783 - - 11,166 

1790 - - 9,784 

1795 - - 12,113 

1800 - - 9,048 

In 1770, the Sound duties amounted to 459,890 rix* 

dollars ; and they have probably been increased since 

that period to about half a miUion. To these sources 

of revenue are to be added, a capitation tax, a land 

tax, a tax on rank, a tax on places, pensions, and the 

clergy ; the stamps, customs, and excise ; constituting 

a revenue of 7,270,172 rixdollars.* The following is a 

table of the expenses of the Danish government. 

Rixdollars. 
The court ..... 250,000 
The minor branches of the royal family - 160,000 
Civil servants .... 707,500 

Secret service money and pensions - 231,000 

•Army 2,080,000 

Navy 1,200,000 

East India colonies - - - 180,000 

Bounties to commerce and manufactures 300,000 

Annuities .... 27,000 

Buildings and repairs ' - - 120,000 

Interest of the public debt - - 1,100,000 

Sinking fund .... 150,000 



Total 



6,525,500 



The state of the Danish debt does not appear to be 
well ascertained. Voyage des deux Francois makes it 
amount to 13,645,046 rixdollars. Catteau seems to 
think it must have been above 20,000,000 rixdollars at 
that period. The Danish government has had great 
recourse to the usual expedient of issuing paper money. 
So easy a method of getting rich has of course been 
abused ; and the paper was, in the year 1790, at a dis- 
count of 8, 9, and 10 per cent. There is, in general, a 
great want of specie in Denmark : for, though all the 
Sound duties are paid in gold and silver, the govern- 
rnent is forced to export a considerable quantity of the 
precious metals, for the payment of its foreign debts 
and agents ; and, in spite of the rigid prohibitions to 
the contrary, the Jews, who swarm at Copenhagen, — 
export Danish ducats to a large value. The court of 
Denmark has no great credit out of its own dominions, 
and has always experienced a considerable difficulty 
in raising its loans in Switzerland, Genoa, and Hol- 
land, the usual markets it has resorted to for that 
purpose. 

In -the census taken in 1769, the return was as 
follows : 



In Denmark 


. 


785,690 


Norway 
Iceland 


. 


722,141 


- 


46,201 


Ferro Isles 


. 


4,754 


Sleswick 


. 


243,605 


Holstein 


. 


134,665 


Oldenbourg am 


Delmenhurst 


79,071 




2,017,127 



This census was taken during the summer, a season 
in which great numbers of sailors are absent from their 

* Upon the subject of the Danish revenues, see Toze's Intro- 
duction to the Statistics, edited and improved by Heinz, 1799, 
torn. xi. From this work Mr. Catteau has taken his informa- 
tion concerning the Danish revenues. See also the 19th cap. 
vol. ii. of Voyage des deux Francais, which is admirable for 
extent and precision of information. In general, indeed, this 
work cannot be too much attended toby those who wish to be- 
come acquainted with the statistics of the north of Europe. 



families ; and as it does not include the army, the total 
ought, perhaps, to be raised to 2,225,000. The pre. 
sent population of the Danish states, calculating from 
the tables of life and death, should be about two mill- 
ions and a half ; the census lately taken has not yet 
been published. From registers kept for a number of 
years, it appears that the number of marriages were 
to the whole population, as 1 to 125 ; and the number 
of births to the whole population, were as 1 to 32 or 
33 ; of deaths, as 1 to 38. In 1797, in the diocese of 
Vibourg, out of 8600 children, 80 were bastard : in the 
diocese of Fionia, 280 out of 1146. Out of 1356, dead 
in the first of these dioceses, 100 had attained the age 
of 80, and one of 100. In 1769, the population of the 
towns was 144,105 ; in 1787, it was 142,880. In the 
first of these years, the population of the country was 
641,485 ; and in the latter, 667,165. The population 
of Copenhagen consisted, in the year 1799, of 42,142 
males, and 41 476 females. The deaths exceeded the 
births, says Mr. Catteau ; and to prove it, he exhibits 
a table of deaths and births for six years. Upon cal- 
culating this table, however, it appears, that the sum 
of the births, at Copenhagen, during that period, — 
exceeds the sum of the deaths by 491 or nearly 82 



per annum; about .1 — of the whole population of the 

__6 — ,or nearly 

12 16' 



city. The whole kingdom increases 
j-jjY in a year.* There is no city in Denmark proper, 
except Copenhagen, which has a population of more 
than 5000 souls. The density of population in Den- 
mark proper is about 1300 to the square milcf The 
proportion of births and deaths in the duchies, is the 
same as in Denmark; that of marriages, as 1 to 115. 
Altona, the second city in the Danish dominions, has 
a population of 20,000. The density of population in 
Marschland is 6000 per square mile. The paucity of 
inhabitants in Norway is not merely referable to the 
difficulties of subsistence, but to the administrative 
system established there, and to the bad state of its 
civil and economical laws. It has been more than 
once exposed to the horrors of famine, by the monopo- 
ly of the commerce of grain established there, from 
which, however, it has at length been delivered. The 
proportion of births to the living, is as 1 to 35 ; that of 
deaths to the living, as 1 to 49.$ So that the whole 
Danish dominions increase, every year, by about 2~oT 
and Norway, which has the worst climate and soil, by 
about ^2 5 exceeding the common increase by nearly 
ITcTo of the whole population. Out of 26,197 persons 
who died in Denmark in 1799, there were 165 between 
80 and 100 ; and out of 18,354 who died in Norway the 
same year, there were 208 individuals of the same ad- 
vanced age. The country population is to the town 
population in the ratio of 13 to 137. In some parts of 
Nordland and Finmarken, the population is as low as 
15 to the square mile. 

Within the last twenty or thirty years, the Danes 
have done a great deal for the improvement of their 
country. The peasants, as we have before mentioned, 
are freed from the soil. The greater part of the cleri- 
cal, and much of the lay tithes are redeemed, and the 
corvees and other servile tenures begin to be commu- 
ted for money. A bank of credit is established at Co- 
penhagen, for the loan of money to persons engaged in 
speculations of agriculture and mining. The interest 
is 4 per cent., and the money is repaid by instalments 
in the course of from 21 to 28 years. In the course of 
12 years, the bank has lent about three millions of rix- 
dollars. The external and domestic commerce of 
grain is now placed upon the most liberal footing. 
The culture of potatoes (ce fruit modeste) has at length 
found its way into Denmark, after meeting with the 
same objections which it experienced at its first intro- 
duction from every nation in Europe. Hops are a good 
deal attended to in Fionia, though enough are not yet 
grown for the supply of the country. Tobacco is cul- 
tivated in the environs of Fredericia, in Jutland, by the 

A The average time in which old countries double their pop- 
ulation is stated by Adam Smith to be about 500 years. 

t The same rule is used here as in p. 279. 

I This proportion is very remarkable proof of the longevity 
of the Norwegians. 



186 



WORKS OF THE REV. SIDNEY SMITH. 



industrious descendants of a French colony planted 
there by Frederick IV. Very little hemp and flax are 
grown in the Danish dominions. They had veterinary 
schools previous to the present establishment of them 
in Great Britain. Indeed, there was a greater neces- 
sity for them in Denmark ; as no country in Europe 
has suffered so severely from diseases among its ani- 
mals. The decay of the woods begins to be very per- 
ceptible ; and great quantities, both for fuel and con- 
struction, are annually imported from the other coun- 
tries bordering the Baltic. They have pit-coal ; but, 
either from its inferior quality, or their little skill in 
working it, they are forced to purchase to a consider- 
able amount from England. The Danes have been 
almost driven out of the herring-market by the Swedes. 
Their principal export of this kind is dried fish ; though 
at Altona their fisheries are carried on with more 
appearance of enterprise than elsewhere. The dis- 
tricts of Hedemarken, Hodeland, Toten, and llomerige 
are the parts of Norway most celebrated for the culti- 
vation of grain, which principally consists of oats. 
The distress in Norway is sometimes so great that the 
inhabitants are compelled to make bread of the various 
sorts of lichens, mingled with their grain. It has lately 
been discovered that the Lichen rangiferus, or rein- 
deer's moss, is extremely well calculated for that pur- 
pose. The Norway fisheries bring to the amount of a 
rnillion and a half of rixdollars annually into the coun- 
try. The most remarkable mines in Norway are, the 
gold mines of Edsvold, the silver mines of Konigsberg. 
the copper mines of Raeraas, and the iron mines of 
Arendal and Kragerae, the cobalt mines of Fossum, 
and the black-lead mines of Englidal. The court of 
Denmark is not yet cured of the folly of entering into 
commercial speculations on its own account. From 
the year 1769 to 1792, 78,000 rixdollars per annum 
have been lost on the royal mines alone. Norway 
produces marble of different colours, very beautiful 
granites, mill and whet-stones, and alum. 

The principal manufactures of Denmark are those of 
cloth, cotton-printing, sugar-refining, and porcelain ; of 
which latter manufactures, carried on by the crown, 
the patient proprietors hope that the profits may at 
some future period equal the expenses. The manufac- 
tories for large and small arms are at Frederickwaerk 
and Elsineur ; and at the gates of Copenhagen there 
has lately been erected a cotton spinning-mill upon the 
construction so well known in England. At Tendern, 
in Sleswick, there is a manufacture of lace ; and very 
considerable glass manufactories in several parts of 
Norway. All the manufacturing arts have evidently 
travelled from Lubeck and Hamburg ; the greater part 
of the manufacturers are of German parentage ; and 
vast numbers of manufacturing Germans are to be met 
with, not only in Denmark, but throughout Sweden 
and Russia. 

The Holstein canal, uniting the Baltic and the North 
Sea, is extremely favourable to the interior commerce 
of Denmark, by rendering unnecessary the long and 
dangerous voyage round the peninsula of Jutland. In 
the year 1785, there passed through this canal 409 
Danish, and 44 foreign ships. In the year 1798, 1086 
Danish and 1164 foreign. This canal is so advanta- 
geous, and the passage round Jutland so very bad, that 
goods, before the creation of the canal, were very of- 
ten sent by land from Lubeck to Hamburg. The 
amount of cargoes despatched from Copenhagen for 
Iceland, between the years 1764 and 1784, was 2,560- 
000 rix dollars ; that of the returns, 4,665,000. The 
commerce with the isles of Foeroe is quite inconsider- 
able. The exports from Greenland, in the year 1787, 
amounted to 168,475 rixdollars ; its imports to 74,427'. 
None of these possessions are suffered to trade with 
foreign nations, but through the intervention of the 
mother country. The cargoes despatched to the Dan- 
ish West Indies consist of all sorts of provisions, of 
iron, of copper, of various Danish manufactures, and 
of some East India goods. The returns are made in 
sugar, rum, cotton, indigo, tobacco, and coffee. There 
are about 75 vessels employed in this commerce, from 
the burden of 40 to 200 tons. 

If the slave trade, in pursuance of the laws to that 
•ffect, ceases in the Danish colonies, the establish- 



ments on the coast of Africa will become rather a 
burden than a profit. What measures have been ta- 
ken to insure the abolition, and whether or not the phi 
lanthrophy of the mother country is likely to be de- 
feated by the interested views of the colonists, are del- 
icate points, which Mr. Catteau, who otten seems to 
think more of himself than of his reader, passes over 
with his usual timidity and caution. The present year 
is the period at which all further importation of ne- 
groes ought to cease ; and if this wise and noble law 
be really carried into execution, the Danes will enjoy 
the glory of having been the first to erase this foulest 
blot in the morality of Europe, and to abolish a wick- 
ed and absurd traffic, which purchases its luxuries at 
the price of impending massacre, and present oppres- 
sion. Deferred revenge is always put out to compound 
interest, and exacts its dues with more than Judaical 
rigour. The Africans have begun with the French : 

Jam proximus ardet 

Ucalegon. 

Tea, rhubarb and porcelain are the principal arti- 
cles brought from China. The factories in the East 
Indies send home cotton cloths, silk, sugar, rice, pep- 
per, ginger, indigo, opium, and arrack. Their most 
important East Indian settlement is Fredericksnager.* 
Denmark, after having been long overshadowed by the 
active industry of the Hanseatic towns, and embar- 
rassed by its ignorance of the true principles of com- - 
merce, has at length established important commer- 
cial connections with all the nations of Europe, and 
has regulated those connections by very liberal and en- 
lightened principles. The regulations for the customs, 
published in 1791, are a very remarkable proof of this 
assertion. Every thing is there arranged upon the 
most just and simple principles ; and the whole code 
evidences the striking progress of mercantile knowl- 
edge in that country. In looking over the particulars 
of the Danish commerce, we were struck with the im- 
mense increase of their freightage during the wars of 
this country ; a circumstance which should certainly 
have rendered them rather less disposed to complain 
of the vexations imposed upon the neutral powers du- 
ring such periods.f In the first six months of the year 
1706,5032 lasts of Danish shipping were taken up by 
strangers for American voyages only. The commer- 
cial tonnage of Denmark is put at about 85,000 lasts. 

There appears to exist in the kingdom of Denmark, 
according to the account of Mr. Catteau, a laudible 
spirit of religious toleration; such as, in some instan 
ces, we might copy, with great advantage, in this isl- 
and. It is not, for instance, necessary in Denmark, 
that a man should be a Lutheran, before he can be the 
mayor of a town ; and incredible as it may seem to 
some people, there are many officers and magistrates, 
who are found capable of civil trusts, though they do 
not take the sacraments, exactly in the form pre- 
scribed by the established church. There is no doubt, 
however, of the existence of this very extraordinary 
fact ; and if Mr. Catteau's authority is called in ques- 
tion, we are ready to corroborate it by the testimony 
ot more than one dozen German statistics. The Dan 
ish church consists of 13 bishops, 227 archpriests, and 
2462 priests. The principal part of the benefices are, 
in Norway, in the gift of the crown. In some parts of 
Denmark, the proprietors of the privileged lands are 
the patrons ; in other parts, the parishes. The reve- 
nues of the clergy are from the same sources as our 
own clergy. The sum of the church revenues is com- 
puted to be 1,391,895 rixdollars; which is little more 
than 500 for each clergyman.* The whole court ot 
Denmark is so liberal upon the subject of sectaries, 

* We should very willingly have gone through every branch 
of the Danish commerce, if we had not been apprehensive of 
extending this article too far. Mr. Catteau gives no general 
tables of the Danish exports and imports. A German work 
places them, for the year 1768, as follows :— Exports, 3,067,051 
rixdollars; imports, 3,215,085.— Ur. Kunden, par Gatspari. 

t To say nothing of the increased sale of Norway timber, out 
of 86,000 lasts exported from Norway, 1799, 76,000 came to 
Great Britain. 

% The Jews, however, are still prohibited from entering th» 
kingdom of Norway. 



TABLEAU DES ETATS DANOIS. 



189 



that the whole royal family and the Bishop of Seland 
assisted at the worship of the Calvinists in 1789, when 
they celebrated, in the most public manner, the cente- 
nary of the foundation of their church. In spite of 
this tolerant spirit, it is computed that there are not 
more than 1800 Calvinists in the whole Danish domin- 
ions. At Christianfeld, on the frontiers of Selswick 
and Jutland, there is a colony of Northern Quakers, 
or Hernhutes, of which Mr. Catteau has given a very 
agreeable account. They appear to be characterized 
by the same neatness, order, industry, and absurdity, 
as their brethren in this country ; taking the utmost 
care of the sick and destitute, and thoroughly persua- 
ded that by these good deeds, aided by long pockets 
and slouched hats, they are acting up to the true spirit 
of the Gospel. The Greenlanders were converted to 
Christianity by a Norwegian priest, named John Ege- 
de. He was so eminently suscessful in the object of 
his mission, and contrived to make himself so very 
much beloved, that his memory is still held among 
them in the highest veneration; and they actually 
date their chronology from the year of his arrival, as 
we do ours from the birth of our Saviour. 

There are, in the University of Copenhagen, seven 
professors of theology, two of civil law, two of mathe- 
matics, one of Latin and rhetorick, one of Greek, one 
of oriental languages, one of history, five of medicine, 
one of agriculture, and one of statistics. They enjoy 
a salary of from 1000 to 1500 rixdollars, and are well 
lodged in the university. The University of Copen- 
hagen is extremely rich, and enjoys an income of 
3,000,000 rixdollars. Even Mr. Catteau admits that 
it has need of refoim. In fact, the reputation of uni- 
versities is almost always short-lived, or else it sur- 
vives their merit. If they are endowed, professors 
Decome fat-witted, and never imagine that the arts 
and sciences are any thing else but incomes. If uni- 
versities, slenderly endowed, are rendered famous by 
the accidental occurence of a few great teachers, the 
number of scholars attracted there by the repu- 
tation of the place, makes the situation of a pro- 
fessor worth intriguing for. The learned pate is not 
fond of ducking to the golden fool. He who has the 
best talents for getting the office, has most commonly 
the least for filling it ; and men are made moral and 
mathematical teachers by the same trick and filthi- 
ness with which they are made tide-waiters, and clerks 
of the kitchen. 

The number of students in the University of Copen- 
hagen is about 700 : they come not only from Denmark, 
but from Norway and Iceland : the latter are distin- 
guished as well for the regularity of their manners, as 
for the intensity of their application ; the instruments 
of which application are furnished to them by a library 
containing 60,000 volumes. The Danes have primary 
schools established in their towns, but which have need 
of much reform, before they can answer all the benefi- 
cial ends of such an institution. We should have been 
happy to have learned from Mr. Catteau, the degree 
of information diffused among the lower orders in the 
Danish dominions ; but upon this subject he is silent. 
In the University of Keil there is an institution for the 
instruction of schoolmasters ; and in the list of students 
in the same university, we were a good deal amused to 
find only one student dedicating himself to belles 
lettres. 

The people of Holstein and Sleswick are Dutch in 
their manners, character, and appearance. Their lan- 
guage is in general the low German ; though the better 
sort of people in the towns begin to speak high Ger- 
man.* In Jutland and the isles, the Danish language 
is spoken : within half a century this language has 
been cultivated with some attention : before that peri- 
nd, the Danish writers preferred to make use of the 
Laiin or German language. It is in the island of Fin- 
land that it is spoken with the greatest purity. The 
Danish character is not agreeable. It is marked by 
silence, phlegm and reserve. A Dane is the excess 



x Mr. Catteau's description of Heligoland is entertaining. 
In an island containing a population of 2000, there is neither 
I horse, cart, nor plough. We could not have imagined the 
i possibility of such a fact in any part of Europe. 



and extravagance of a Dutchman; more breeched, 
more ponderous, and more saturnine. He is not often 
a bad member of society in the great points of morals, 
and seldom a good one in the lighter requisites of man- 
ners. His understanding is alive only to the useful 
and the profitable ; he never li"ves for what is merely 
gracious, courteous, and ornamental. His faculties 
seem to be drenched and slackened by the eternal fogs 
in which he resides ; he is never alert, elastic, nor se- 
rene. His state of animal spirits is so low, that what 
in other countries would.be deemed dejection, pro- 
ceeding from casual misfortune, is the habitual ten our 
and complexion of his mind. In all the operations of 
his understanding, he must have time. He is capable 
of undertaking great journeys; but he travels only a 
foot pace, and never leaps nor runs. He loves arith- 
metic better than lyric poetry, and affects Cocker rath- 
er than Pindar. He is slow to speak of fountains and 
amorous maidens; tut can take a spell at porisms as 
well as another ; and will make profound and exten- 
sive combinations of thought, if you pay him for it, 
and do not insist that he shall be brisk or brief. 
There is something, on the contrary, extremely plea- 
sing in the Norwegian style of character. The Nor- 
wegian expresses firmness and elevation in all that he 
says and does. In comparison with the Danes, he 
has always been a free man ; and you read his history 
in his looks. He is not apt, to be sure, to forgive his 
enemies ; but he does not deserve any ; for he is hos- 
pitable in the extreme, and prevents the needy in their 
wants. It is not possible for a writer of this country 
to speak ill of the Norwegians ; for, of all strangers, 
the people of Norway love and admire the British the 
most. In reading Mr. Catteau's account of the con- 
gealed and blighted Laplanders, we were struck with 
the infinite delight they must have in dying ; the on- 
ly circumstance in which they can enjoy any superior- 
ity over the rest of mankind ; or which tends, in their 
instance, to verify the theory of the equality of human 
condition. 

If we pass over Tycho Brahe, and the well known 
history of the Scaldes, of the chronicles of Isleif, 
Saemunder, Hiinfronde, Snorro, Sturleson, and other 
Islandic worthies, the list of Danish literati will best 
prove that they have no literati at all. Are there 
twenty persons in Great Britain who have ever heard 
of Longomontanus, Nicholas Stenaonis, Sperling Lau- 
renburg, Huitfeild, Gramn, Holberg, Langebeck, Car- 
stens, Suhm, Kofod, Anger? or of the living Wad, 
Fabricius, Hanch, Tode, and Zaega ? We do riot deny 
merit to these various personages ; many of them 
may be much admired by those who are more conver- 
sant in Danish literature than we can pretend to be , 
but they are certainly not names on which the learned 
fame of any country can be built very high. They 
have no classical celebrity and diffusion : they are not 
an universal language ; they have not enlarged their 
original dominion, and become the authors of Europe 
instead of the authors of Denmark. It would be loss of 
time to speak of the fine arts in Denmark: they hardly 
exist. 

We have been compelled to pass over many parts 
of Mr. Catteau's book more precipitately than we 
could have wished ; but we hope we have said and ex- 
hibited enough of it, to satisfy the public that it is, 
upon the whole, a very valuable publication. The 
two great requisites for his undertaking, moderation 
and industry, we are convinced this gentleman pos- 
sesses in an eminent degree. He represents every 
thing without prejudice, and he represents every thing 
authentically. The same cool and judicious disposi- 
tion which clears him from the spirit of party, makes 
him perhaps cautious in excess. We are convinced 
that every thing he says is true ; but we have been 
sometimes induced to suspect that we do not see the 
whole truth. After all, perhaps, he has told as much 
truth as he could do, compatibly with the opportunity 
of telling any. A person more disposed to touch upon 
critical and offensive subjects might not have sub- 
mitted as diligently to the investigation of truth, with 
which passion was not concerned. How few writers 
are, at the same time, laborious, impartial, and in 
trepid ! 



190 



WORKS OF THE REV. SIDNEY SMITH. 



We cannot conclude *his article without expressing 
the high sense we entertain of the importance of such 
researches as those in which Mr. Catteau has been 
engaged. They must form the basis of all interior re- 
gulations, and ought principally to influence the con- 
duct of every country in its relations towards foreign 
powers. As they contain the best estimate of the 
wealth and happiness of a people, they bring theory 
to the strictest test; and measure, better than all 
reasoning, the wisdom with which laws are made, and 
the mildness with which they are administered. If 
such judicious and elaborate surveys of the state of 
this and other countries in Europe, had been made 
from time to time for the last two centuries, they 
would have quickened and matured the progress of 
knowledge, and the art of governing by throwing light 
on the spirit and tendency of laws ; they would have 
checked the spirit of officious interference in legisla- 
tion ; have softened persecution, and expanded narrow 
conceptions of national policy. The happiness of a 
nation would have been proclaimed by the fulness of 
its garners, and the multitudes of its sheep and oxen ; 
and rulers might sometimes have sacrificed their 
schemes of ambition, or their unfeeling splendour, at 
the detail of silent fields, empty harbours, and famished 
peasants. 



THOUGHTS ON THE RESIDENCE OF THE 
CLERGY. (Edinburgh Review, 1803.) 

Thoughts on the Residence of the Clergy. By John Stur- 
ges, LL. D. 

This pamphlet is the production of a gentleman who 
has acquired a right to teach the duties of the clerical 
character by fulfilling them ; and who has exercised 
that right, in the present instance, with honour to 
himself, and benefit to the public. From the particu- 
lar character of understanding evinced in this work, 
we should conceive Dr. Sturges to possess a very pow- 
erful claim to be heard on all questions referable to 
the decision of practicable good sense. He has avail- 
ed himself of his experience to observe ; and of his ob- 
servation, to judge well ; he neither loves his profes- 
sion too little, nor too much ; is alive to its interests, 
without being insensible to those of the community at 
large ; and treats of those points where his previous 
habits might render a little intemperance venial, as 
well as probable, with the most perfect good humour 
and moderation. 

As exceptions to the general and indisputable princi- 
ple of residence, Dr. Sturges urges the smallness of 
some livings ; the probability that their incumbents 
be engaged in the task of education, or in ecclesiasti- 
cal duty, in situations where their talents may be 
more appropriately and importantly employed. Dr. 
Sturges is also of opinion, that the power of enforcing 
residence under certain limits, should be invested in 
the bishops ; and that the acts prohibiting the clergy 
to hold or to cultivate land, should be in a great mea- 
sure repealed. 

We sincerely hope that the two cases suggested by 
Dr. Sturges, of the clergyman who may keep a school, 
or be engaged in the duty of some parish not his own, 
will be attended to in the construction of the ap- 
proaching bill, and admitted as pleas for non-resi- 
dence. It certainly is better that a clergyman should 
do the duty of his own benefice, rather than of any 
other. But the injury done to the community, is not 
commensurate with the vexation imposed upon the in- 
dividual. Such a measure is either too harsh, not to 
become obsolete ; or, by harassing the clergy with a 
very severe restriction, to gain a very disproportionate 
good to the commnuity, would bring the profession in- 
to disrepute, and have a tendency to introduce a class 
of men into the church, of less liberal manners, edu- 
cation, and connection ; points of the utmost import- 
ance, in our present state of religion and wealth. No- 
thing has enabled men to do wrong with impunity so 
much as the extreme severities of the penalties with 
which the law has threatened them. The only me- 
thod to insure success to the bill for enforcing ecclesi- 



astical residence, is to consult the convenience of the 
clergy in its construction, as far as is possibly con- 
sistent with the object desired, and even to sacrifice 
something that ought to be done, in order that much 
may be done. Upon this principle, the clergyman 
should not be confined to his parsonage-house, but to 
the precincts of his parish. Some advantage would 
certainly attend the residence of the clergy in their 
official mansions ; but, as we have before observed, 
the good one party would obtain, bears no sort of pro- 
portion to the evil the other would suffer. 

Upon the propriety of investing the bench of bishops 
with a power of enforcing residence, we confess our- 
selves to entertain very serious doubts. A bishop has 
frequently a very temporary interest in his diocese : 
he has favours to ask ; and he must grant them 
Leave of absence will be granted to powerful inter- 
cession ; and refused, upon stronger pleas, to men with- 
out friends. Bishops are frequently men advanced in 
years, or immersed in study. A single person who 
compels many others to their duty, has much odium 
to bear, and much activity to exert. A bishop is sub- 
ject to caprice, and enmity, and passion, in common 
with other individuals; there is some danger, also, 
that his power over the clergy may be converted to a 
political purpose. From innumerable causes, which 
might be reasoned upon to great length we are appre- 
hensive the object of the legislature will be entirely 
frustrated in a few years, if it be committed to episco- 
pal superintendence and care ; though, upon the first 
view of the subject, no other scheme can appear so 
natural and so wise. 

Dr. Sturges observes, that after all the conceivable 
justifications of non-residence are enumerated in the 
act, many others must from time to time occur, and in- 
dicate the propriety of vesting somewhere a discreti- 
onary power. If this be true of the penalties by which 
the clergy are governed, it is equally true of other pe- 
nal laws ; and the law should extend to every offence 
the contingency of discretionary omission. The ob- 
jection to this system is, that it trusts too much to the 
sagacity and the probity of the judge, and exposes a 
country to the partial, lax, and corrupt administration 
of its laws. It is certainly inconvenient, in many ca- 
ses, to have no other guide to resort to but the unac- 
commodating mandates of an act of Parliament : yet, 
of the two inconveniences, it is the least. It is some 
palliation of the evils of discretionary power, that it 
should be exercised (as by the court of chancery) in 
the face of day, and that the moderator himself be 
moderated by the force of precedent and opinion. A 
bishop will exercise this discretionary power in the 
dark ; he is at full liberty to depart to-morrow from 
the precedent he has established to-day , and to apply 
the same decisions to different, or different decisions 
to the same circumstances, as his humour or interest 
may dictate. Such power may be exercised well un- 
der one judge of extraordinary integrity ; but it is not 
very probable he will find a proper successor. To 
suppose a series of men so much superior to tempta- 
tion, and to construct a system of church government 
upon such a supposition, is to build upon sand, with 
materials not more durable than the foundation. 

Sir William Scott has made it very clear, by his ex- 
cellent speech, that it is not possible, in the present 
state of the revenues of the English church, to apply 
a radical cure to the evil of non-residence. It is there 
stated, that out of 11,700 livings, there are 6000 under 
80Z. per annum ; many of those, 20L, 301., and some as 
low as 21. or 3Z. per annum. In such a state of endow- 
ment, all idea of rigid residence is out of the question. 
Emoluments which a footman would spurn, can hard- 
ly recompense a scholar and a gentleman. A mere 
palliation is all that can be applied ; and these are the 
ingredients of which we wish such a palliation should 
be composed : — 

1. Let the clergymen have full liberty of farming, 
and be put in this respect exactly upon a footing with 
laymen. 

2. Power to reside in any other house in the parish, 
as well as the parsonage-house, and to be absent five 
months in the year. 

3. Schoolmasters, and ministers bond fide discharg. 



TRAVELS FROM PALESTINE. 



191 



ing ministerial functions in another parish, exempt from 
residence. 

4. Penalties in proportion to the value of livings, 
and number of times the offence has been committed. 

'5. Common informers to sue as at present ; though 
probably it might be right to make the name of one 
parishioner a necessary addition ; and a proof of non- 
residence might be made to operate as a nonsuit in an 
action for tithes. 

6. No action for non-residence to lie where the be- 
nefice was less than 80Z. per annum ; and the powers 
of bishops to remain precisely as they are. 

These indulgences would leave the clergy without 
excuse, would reduce the informations to a salutary 
number, and diminish the odium consequent upon 
them, by directing their effects against men who re- 
gard church perferment merely as a source of revenue, 
not as an obligation to the discharge of important du- 
ties. 

We venture to prognosticate, that a bill of greater 
severity either wfll not pass the House of Commons, 
cr will fail of its object. Considering the times and 
circumstances, we are convinced we have stated the 
greatest quantum of attainable good ; which of course 
will not be attained, by the customary error, of at- 
tending to what is desirable to be done, rather than 
to what it is practicable to do. 



TRAVELS FROM PALESTINE. (Edinburgh Re- 
view, 1807.) 

The Travels of Bertrandon de la Brocquiere, First Esquire- 
Carver to Philip le Bon, Duke of Burgundy, during the 
years 1432, 1433.— Translated from the French, by Thomas 
Johnes, Esq. 

In the year 1432, many great lords in the dominions 
of Burgundy, holding office under Duke Philip le 
Bon, made a pilgrimage to Jerusalem. Among them 
was his first esquire-carver La Brocquiere, who, hav- 
ing performed many devout pilgrimages in Palestine, 
returned sick to Jerusalem, and during his convales- 
cence, formed the bold scheme of returning to France 
over land. This led him to traverse the western parts 
of Asia, and Eastern Europe ; and, during the whole 
journey, except towards the end of it, he passed 
through the dominions of the Mussulmen. The exe- 
cution of such a journey even at this day, would not 
be without difficulty ; and it was then thought to be 
impossible. It was in vain that his companions at- 
tempted to dissuade him ; he was obstinate ; and, set- 
ting out, overcome every obstacle ; returned in the 
course of the year 1433, and presented himself to the 
duke in his Saracen dress, and on the horse which had 
carried him during the whole of his journey. The 
duke, after the fashion of great people, conceiving 
that the glory of his esquire-carver was his own, 
stiused the work to be printed and published. 

The following is a brief extract of this valiant per- 
son's perigrinations. 'After performing the customary 
pilgrimages, we went,' says La Brocquiere, ' to the 
mountain where Jesus fasted forty days ; to Jordan, 
where he was baptized ; to the church of St. Martha, 
where Lazarus was raised from the dead ; to Bethle- 
hem, where he was born ; to the birth place of St. 
John the Baptist ; to the house of Zachariah ; and, 
lastly, to the holy cross, where the tree grew that 
formed the real cross.' From Jerusalem the first gen- 
tleman-carver betook himself to Mount Sinai, paying 
pretty handsomely to the Saracens for that privilege. 
These infidels do not appear to have ever prevented 
the Christian pilgrims from indulging their curiosity 
and devotion in visiting the most interesting evangeli- 
cal objects in the Holy Land ; but, after charging a 
good round price for their gratification, contented 
themselves with occasionally kicking them, and spit- 
ting upon them. In his way to Mount Sinai, the 
esquire-carver passed through the Valley of Hebron, 
where he tells us, Adam was created ; and from thence 
to Gaza, where they showed him the columns of the 
building which Samson pulled down; though, of the 
identity of the building, the esquire seems to enter- 



tain some doubts. At Gaza five of his companions 
fell sick and returned to Jerusalem. The second 
day's journey in the desert the carver fell ill also,— 
returned to Gaza, where he was cured by a Samaritan, 
— and finding his way back to Jerusalem, hired some 
pleasant lodgings on Mount Sion. 

Before he proceeded on his grand expedition over 
land, he undertook a little expedition to Nazareth — 
hearing, first of all, divine service at Cordeliers, and 
imploring, at the tomb of our lady, her protection for 
his journey. From Jerusalem their first stage was 
Acre, where they gave up their intended expedition, 
and repaired to Baruth, whence Sir Samson de La- 
laing and the author sallied afresh, under better aus- 
pices, to Damascus. He speaks with great pleasure of 
the valley where Noah built the ark, through which 
valley he passed in his way to Damascus ; upon enter- 
ing which town he was knocked down by a Saracen 
for wearing an ugly hat — as he probably would be in 
London for the same offence in the year 1807. At 
Damascus, he informs us the Christians are locked up 
every night, as they are in English workhouses, night 
and day, when they happen to be poor. The greatest 
misfortune attendant upon this Damascene incarcera- 
tion , is the extreme irregularity with which the doors 
are opened in the morning, their janitor having no 
certain hour of quitting his bed. At Damascus, he 
saw the place where St. Paul had a vision. < I saw, 
also,' says he, ' the stone from which St. George 
mounted his horse, when he went to combat the dra- 
gon. It is two feet square ; and they say, that when 
formerly the Saracens attempted to carry it away, in 
spite of all the strength they employed, they could 
not succeed.' After having seen Damascus, he returns 
with Sir Samson to Baruth ; and communicates his 
intentions of returning over land to France to his com- 
panions. They state to him the astonishing difficulties 
he will have to overcome in the execution of so extra- 
ordinary a project ; but the admirable carver, deter- 
mined to make no bones, and to cut his way through 
every obstacle, persists in his scheme, and bids them 
a final adieu. He is determined, however, not to be 
baffled in his subordinate expedition to Nazareth; and, 
having now got rid of his timid companions, accom- 
plishes it with ease. We shall here present our read- 
ers with an extract from this part of his journal, re- 
questing them to admire the naif manner in which he 
speaks of the vestiges of ecclesiastical history. 

' Acre, though in a plain of about four leagues in extent, is 
surrounded on three sides by mountains, and on the fourth by 
the sea. I made acquaintance there with a Venetian merchant 
called Aubert Franc, who received me well, and procured me 
much useful information respecting my two pilgrimages, by 
which I profited. With the aid of his advice, I took the road 
to Nazareth ; and, having crossed an extensive plain, came to 
the fountain, the water of which our Lord changed into wine 
at the marriage of Archetreclin; it is near a village where St. 
Peter is said to have been born. 

' Nazareth is another large village, built between two moun- 
tains ; but the place where the angel Gabriel came to an- 
nounce to the Virgin Mary that she would be a mother, is in a 
pitiful state. The church that had been there built is entirely 
destroyed ; and of the house wherein our lady was when the 
angel appeared to her, not the smallest remnant exists. 

4 From Nazareth I went to Mount Tabor, the place where 
the transfiguration of our Lord, and many other miracles took 
effect. These pasturages attract the Arabs who come thither 
with their beasts ; and I was forced to engage four additional 
men as an escort, two of whom were Arabs. The ascent of the 
mountain is rugged, because there is no road ; I performed it 
on the back of a mule, but it took me two hours. The summit 
is terminated by an almost circular plain of about two bow- 
shots in length, and one in width. It was formerly enclosed 
with walls, the ruins of which, and the ditches, are still visible : 
within the wall, and around it, were several churches, and one 
especially, where, although in ruins, full pardon for vice and 
sin is gained. 

' We went to lodge at Samaria, because I wished to see the 
lake of Tiberias, where it is said St. Peter was accustomed to 
fish ; and, by so doing, some pardons may be gained, for it was 
the ember week of September. The Moucre left me to myself 
the whole day. Samaria is situated on the extremity of a 
mountain. We entered at the clc-se of day, and left it at mid- 
night to visit the lake. The Moucre had proposed this hour 
to evade the tribute exacted from all who go thither ; but the 
night hindred me from seeing the surrounding country. 
« I went first to Joseph's Well, so called from his being cut 



193 



WORKS OF THE REV. SIDNEY SMITH. 



into it by his brethren. There is a handsome mosque near it, 
which I entered with my Moucre, pretending to be a Saracen. 
• Further on is a stone bridge over the Jordon, called Jacob's 
Bridge, on account of a house hard by, said to be the residence 
of that patriarch. The river flows from a gentle lake situated 
at the foot of a mountain to the north-west, on which Namcar- 
din has a very handsome castle.'— (pp. 122—128.) 

From Damascus, to which he returns after his expe- 
dition to Nazareth, the first carver of Philip le Bon 
sets out v/ith the caravan for Bursa. Before he begins 
upon his journey, he expatiates with much satisfac- 
tion upon the admirable method of shoeing horses at 
Damascus — a panegyric which certainly gives us the* 
lowest ideas of that art in the reign of Philip le Bon ; 
for it appears that, out of fifty days, his horse was 
lame for twenty-one, owing to this ingenious method 
of shoeing. As a mark of gratitude to the leader of 
the caravan, the esquire presents him with a pot of 
green ginger; and the caravan proceeds. Before it has 
advanced one day's journey, the esquire, however, de- 
viates from the road, to pay his devoirs to a miracu- 
lous image of our Lady ot Serdenay, which always 
sweats — not ordinary sudorific matter — but an oil of 
great ecclesiastical efficacy. While travelling with 
the caravan, he learnt to sit cross-legged, got drunk 
privately, and was nearly murdered by some Saracens, 
who discovered that he had money. In some parts of 
Syria, M. de la Brocquiere met with an opinion, which 
must have been extremely favourable to the spirit of 
proselytism, in so very hot a country — an opinion 
that the infidels have a very bad smell, and that this 
is only to be removed by baptism. But as the baptism 
was according to the Greek ritual, by total immersion, 
Bertrandon seems to have a distant suspicion that this 
miracle may be resolved into the simple phenomenon 
of washing. He speaks well of the Turks, and repre- 
sents them, to our surprise, as a very gay, laughing 
people. We thought Turkish gravity had been almost 
proverbial. The natives of the countries through 
which we passed, pray (says he) for the conversion of 
Christians ; and especially request that there may 
be never sent among them again such another terrible 
man as Godfrey of Boulogne. At Couhongue the cara- 
van broke up ; and here he quitted a Mameluke sol- 
dier, who had kept him company during the whole of 
the journey, and to whose courage and fidelity Europe, 
Philip le Bon, and Mr. Johnes of Hafod, are principally 
indebted for the preservation of the first esquire- 
carver. 

' I bade adieu,' he says, ' to my Mameluke. This good man, 
whose name was Mohammed, had done me innumerable servi- 
ces. He was very charitable, and never refused alms when 
asked in the name of God. It was through charity he had 
been so kind to me ; and I must confess that, without his assis- 
tance, I could not have performed my journey without incur- 
ring the greatest danger : and that had it not been for his kind- 
ness, I should often have been exposed to cold and hunger, 
and much embarrassed with my horse. 

' On taking leave of him, I was desirous of showing my gra- 
titude ; but he would not accept of any thing except a piece 
of our fine European cloth to cover his head, which seemed to 
please him much. He told me all the occasions that had come 
to his knowledge, on which, if it had not been for him, I should 
have run risks of being assassinated, and warned me to be 
very circumspect in my connections with the Saracens, for 
that there were among them some as wicked as the Franks. I 
write this to recall to my reader's memory, that the person 
who, from his love to God, did me so many and essential kind- 
nesses, was a man not of our faith.'— (pp. 196, 197.) 

For the rest of his journey, he travelled with the 
family of the leader of the caravan, without any oc- 
currence more remarkable than those we have already 
noticed — arrived at Constantinople, and passed through 
Germany to the court of Philip le Bon. Here his nar- 
rative concludes. Nor does the carver vouchsafe to 
inform us of the changes which time had made in the 
appetite of that great prince ; whether veal was more 
pleasing to him than lamb — if his favourite morsels 
were still in request — if animal succulence were as 
grateful to him as before the departure of the carver — 
or if this semisanguineous partiality had given wa.y to 
a taste for cinereous and torrefied meats. All these 
things the first esquire-carver might have said, — none 
of them he does say —nor does Mr. Johnes of Hafod 



supply, by any antiquarian conjectures of his own, the 
distressing silence of the original. Saving such omis- 
sions, there is something pleasant in the narrative of 
this arch-divider of fowls. He is an honest, brave, 
liberal man ; and tells his singular story with great 
brevity and plainness. We are obliged to Mr. Johnes 
for the amusement he has afforded us ; and we hope 
he will persevere in his gentlemanlike, honourable, 
and useful occupations. 



LETTER ON THE CURATE'S SALARY BILL.* 
(Edinburgh Review, 1808.) 

A Letter to the Right Honourable Spencer Perceval, on a Sub- 
ject connected with his Bill, now under Discussion in Parlia- 
ment, for improving the Situation of Stipendiary Curates. 
8vo. Hatchard, London. 1808. 

The poverty of curates has long been a favourite 
theme with novelists, sentimental tourists, and elegi- 
ac poets. But notwithstanding the known accuracy 
of this class of philosophers, we cannot help suspect- 
ing that there is a good deal of misconception in the 
popular estimate of the amount of the evil. 

A very great proportion of all the curacies in Eng- 
land are filled with men to whom the emolument is a 
matter of subordinate importance. They are filled by 
young gentlemen who have recently left college, who 
of course are able to subsist as they had subsisted for 
seven years before, and who are glad to have an op- 
portunity, on any terms, of acquiring a practical 
familiarity with the duties of their profession. They 
move away from them to higher situations as vacan- 
cies occur ; and make way for a new race of ecclesias- 
tical apprentices. To those men, the smallness of 
the appointment is a grievance of no very great mag- 
nitude ; nor is it fair, with relation to them, to repre- 
sent the ecclesiastical order as degraded by the indi- 
gence to which some of its members are condemned. 
With regard, again, to those who take curacies merely 
as a means of subsistence, and with the prospect of 
remaining permanently in that situation, it is certain 
that by far the greater part of them are persons born 
in a very humble rank in society, and accustomed to 
no greater opulence than that of an ordinary curate. 
There are scarcely any of those persons who have 
taken a degree in an university, and not very many 
who have "resided there at all. Now the son of a 
small Welsh farmer, who works hard every day for 
less than 40Z. a year, has no great reason to complain 
of degradation or disappointment, if he get from 50J. 
to 1001. for a moderate portion of labour one day in 
seven. The situation, accordingly, is looked upon by 
these people as extremely elegible ; and there is a 
great competition for curacies, even as they are now 
provided. The amount of the evil, then, as to the 
curates themselves, cannot be considered as very enor- 
mous, when there are so few who either actually feel, 
or are entitled to feel, much discontent on the subject. 
The late regulations about residence, too, by dimin- 
ishing the total number of curates, will obviously 
throw that office chiefly into the hands of the well ed- 
ucated and comparatively independent young men, 
who seek for the situation rather for practice than 
profit, and do not complain of the want of emolu- 
ment. 

Still we admit it to be an evil, that the resident 
clergyman of a parish should not be enabled to hold a i 
respectable rank in society from the regular emolu- 
ments of his office. But it is an evil which does not! 
exist exclusively among curates ; and which, wherev- 
er it exits, we are afraid is irremediable, without the: 
destruction of the Episcopal church, or the augmenta- 
tion of its patrimony. More than one-half of the liv- 
ings in England are under 80Z. a year ; and the whole 
income of the church, including that of the bishops, if 

* Now we are all dead, it may be amusing to state, that I 
was excited to this article by Sir William Scott, who brought 
me the book in his pocket ; and begged I would attend to it,' 
carefully concealing his name ; my own opinions happened' 
entirely to agree with his. 



CURATE'S SALARY BILL. 



193 



thrown into a common fund, would not afford above 
180/. lor each living. Unless Mr. Perceval, therefore, 
will raise an additional million or two for the church, 
there must be poor curates, — and poor rectors also ; 
and unless he is to reduce the Episcopal hierarchy to 
the republican equality of our Presbyterian model, he 
must submit to very considerable inequalities in the 
distribution of this inadequate provision. 

instead of applying any of these remedies, howev- 
er, — instead of proposing to increase the income of 
the church, or to raise a fund for its lowest servants 
by a general assessment upon those who are more op- 
ulent, — instead of even tryir$j indirectly to raise the 
pay of curates, by raising their qualifications in res- 
pect of regular education, Mr. Perceval has been able, 
after long and profound study, to find no better cure 
for the endemic poverty of curates, than to ordain all 
rectors of certain income, to pay them one-fifth part 
of their emoluments, and to vest certain alarming 
powers in the bishops for the purpose of controlling 
their appointment. Now this scheme, it appears to 
us, has all the faults which it is possible for such a 
scheme to have. It is unjust and partial in its princi- 
ple, — it is evidently altogether and utterly inefficient 
for the correction of the evil in question, — and it in- 
troduces other evils infinitely greater than that which 
it vainly proposes to abolish. 

To this project, however, for increasing the salary 
of curates, Mr. Perceval has been so long and so obsti- 
nately partial, that he returned to the charge in the 
last session of Parliament, for the third time ; and ex- 
perienced, in spite of his present high situation, the 
same defeat which had baffled him in his previous at- 
tempts. 

Though the subject is gone by once more for the pre- 
sent, we cannot abstain from bestowing a little gentle 
violence to aid its merited descent into the gulf of 
oblivion, and to extinguish, if possible, that resurgent 
principle which has so often disturbed the serious bu- 
siness of the country, and averted the attention of the 
public from the great scenes that are acting in the 
world— to search for some golden medium between the 
selfishness of the sacred principal, and the rapacity of 
the sacred deputy. 

If church property is to be preserved, that precedent 
is not without danger which disposes at once of a fifth 
of all the valuable livings in England. We do not ad- 
vance this as an argument of any great importance 
against the bill, but only as an additional reason why 
its utility should, be placed in the clearest point of view, 
before it can attain the assent of well- wishers to the 
English establishment. 

Our first and greatest objection to such a measure, 
is the increase of power which it gives to the bench of 
bishops, — an evil which may produce the most serious 
effects, by placing r Jhe whole body of the clergy under 
the absolute control of men who are themselves so 
much under the influence of the crown. This, indeed, 
has been pretty effectually accomplished, by the late 
residence bill of Sir William Scott ; and our objection 
to the present bill is, that it tends to augment that ex- 
cessive power before conferred on the prelacy. 

If a clergyman lives in a situation which is destroy- 
ing his constitution, — he cannot exchange with a broth- 
er clergyman without the consent of the bishop ; in 
whose hands, under such circumstances, his life and 
death are actually placed. If he wishes to cultivate a 
little land for his amusement or better support, — he 
cannot do it without the license of the bishop. If he 
wishes to spend the last three or four months with a 
declining wife or child at some spot where better med- 
ical assistance can be procured, — he cannot do so with- 
out permission of the bishop. If he is struck with 
palsy, or racked with stone, — the bishop can confine 
him 'in the most remote village in England. In short, 
the power which the bishops at present possess over 
their clergy, is so enormous, that none but a fool or a 
madman would think of compromising his future hap- 
piness, by giving the most remote cause of offence to 
his diocesan. We ought to recollect, however, that 
the clergy constitute a body of 12 or 15,000 educated 
persons ; that the whole concern of education devolves 

N 



upon them ; that some share of the talents and infor- 
mation which exist in the country must naturally fall 
to their lot ; and that the complete subjugation of such 
a body of men cannot, in any point of view, be a mat- 
ter of indifference to a free country. 

It is in vain to talk of the good character of bishops. 
Bishops are men ; not always the wisest of men ; not 
always preferred for eminent virtues and talents, or for 
any good reason whatever known to the public. They 
are almost always devoid of striking and indecorous 
vices ; but a man may be very shallow, very arrogant, 
and very vindictive, though a bishop ; and pursue with 
unrelenting hatred a subordinate clergyman, whose 
principles he dislikes,* and whose genius he fears. 
Bishops, besides, are subject to the infirmities of old 
age, like other men ; and in the decay of strength and 
understanding, will be governed as other men are, by 
daughters and wives, and whoever ministers to their 
daily comforts. We have no doubt that such cases 
sometimes occur ; and produce, whenever they do oc- 
cur, a very capricious administration of ecclesiastical 
affairs.f As the power of enforcing residence must be 
lodged somewhere, why not give the bishop a council, 
consisting of two-thirds ecclesiastics, and. one-third 
laymen : and meeting at the same time as the sessions 
and deputy sessions ; — the bishop's license for non- 
residence to issue, of course, upon their recommenda- 
tions ? Considering the vexatious bustle of a new, and 
the laxity of an aged bishop, we cannot but think that 
a diocese would be much more steadily administered 
under this system than by the present means. 

Examine the constitutional effects of the power now 
granted to the bench. What hinders a bishop from 
becoming in the hands of the court, a very important 
agent in all county elections ? what clergyman would 
dare to refuse him his vote ? But it will be said that 
no bishop will ever condescend to such sort of in- 
trigues : — a most miserable answer to a most serious 
objection. The temptation is admitted, — the absence 
of all restraint ; — the dangerous consequences are 
equally admitted ; and the only preservative is the 
personal character of the individual. If this style of 
reasoning were general, what would become of law, 
constitution, and every wholesome restraint which we 
have been accumulating for so many centuries ? We 
have no intention to speak disrespectfully of constitut- 
ed authorities ; but when men can abuse power with 
impunity, and recommend themselves to their superi- 
ors by abusing it, it is but common sense to suppose 
that power will be abused ; if it is, the country will 
hereafter be convulsed to its very entrails, in tearing 
away that power from the prelacy which has been so 
improvidently conferred upon them. It is useless to 
talk of the power they anciently possessed. They 
have never possessed it since England has been what 
it now is. Since we have enjoyed practically a free 
constitution, the bishops have, in point of fact, possess- 
ed little or no power of oppression over their clergy. 

It must be remembered, however, that we are speak- 
ing only of probabilities : the fact may turn out to be 
quite the reverse ; the power vested in the bench may 
be exercised for spiritual purposes only, and with the 
greatest moderation. We shall be extremely happy 
to find that this is the case ; and it will reflect great 
honour upon those who have corrected the improvi- 
dence of the legislature by their own sense of propri- 
ety. 

It is contended by the friends of this law, that the 
respectability of the clergy depends in some measure 
on their wealth ; and that, as the rich bishop reflects a 
sort of worldly consequence upon the poor bishop, and 
the rich rector upon the poor rector ; — so, a rich class 
of curates could not fail to confer a greater degree of 
importance upon that class of men in general. This is 
all very well, if you intend to raise up some new fund 
in order to enrich curates : but you say that the riches 
of some constitute the dignity of the whole ; and then 
you immediately take away from the rector the *u» 

* Bold language for the year 1808. 

t I have seen in the course of my fife, as the mind of the 
prelate decayed, wife bishops, daughter bishops, butler buut- 
ops, and even cook and housekeeper bishops. 



W4 



WORKS OF THE REV. SIDNEY SMITH. 



perfluous wealth which, according to your own method i 
of reasoning, is to decorate and dignify the order of | 
men to whom he belongs ! The bishops constitute the j 
first class in the church ; the beneficed clergy the 
second ; the curates the last. Why are you to take 
from the second to give to the last ? Why not as well 
from the first* to give to the second, — if you really 
mean to contend that the first and second are already 
too rich ? 

It is not true, however, that the class of rectors is 
generally either too rich, or even rich enough. There 
are 6000 livings below 80?. per annum, which is not 
very much above the average allowance of a curate. — 
If every rector, however, who has more than 500L is 
obliged to give a fifth part to a curate, there seems to 
be no reason why every bishop who has more than 
1000Z. should not give a fifth part among the poor rec- 
tors in his diocese. It is in vain to say this assessment 
upon rectors is reasonable and right, because they may 
reside and do duty themselves, and then they will not 
need a curate ; — that their non-residence, in short, is a 
kind of delinquency for which they compound by this 
fine to the parish. If more than a half of the rectories 
in England are under 801. a year, and some thousands 
of them under 401., pluralities are absolutely necessary- 
and clergymen, who have not the gift of ubiquity, 
must be non-resident at some of them. Curates, there- 
tore, are not the deputies of negligent rectors ; — they 
are an order of priests absolutely necessary in the 
present form of the Church of England : and a rector 
incurs no shadow of delinquency by employing one, 
more than the king does by appointing a lord-lieuten- 
ant of Ireland, or a commissioner to the General As- 
sembly of the Church of Scotland, instead of doing the 
duty of these offices in person. If the legislature, 
therefore, is to interfere to raise the natural, i. e., the 
actual wages of this order of men, at the expense of 
the more opulent ministers of the Gospel, there seems 
to be no sort of reason for exempting the bishops from 
their share in this pious contribution, or for refusing to 
make a similar one for the benefit of all rectors who 
have less than 100Z. per annum. 

The true reason, however, for exempting my lords 
the bishops from this imposition, is, that they have 
the privilege of voting upon all bills brought in by Mr. 
Perceval, and of materially affecting his comfort and 
security by their parliamentary control and influence. 
This, however, is to cure what you believe to be un- 
just, by means which you must know to be unjust ; — 
to fly out against abuses which may be remedied with- 
out peril, and to connive at them when the attempt at 
a. remedy is attended with political danger ; to be mute 
and obsequious towards men who enjoy church prop- 
erty to the amount of 8 or 19,0002. per annum ; and to 
be so scandalized at those who possess as many hund- 
reds, that you must melt their revenues down into cu- 
racies, and save to the eye of political economy the 
spectacle of such flagrant inequality ! 

In the same style of reasoning, it may be asked why 
the lay impropnetors are not compelled to advance 
the salary of their perpetual curacies, up to a fifth of 
their estates? The answer, too, is equally obvious — 
Many lay improprietors have votes in both houses of 
Parliament ; and the only class of men this cowardly 
reformation attacks, is that which has no means of 
saying anything in its own defence. 

Even if the enrichment of curates were the most im- 
perious of all duties, it might very well be questioned, 
whether a more unequal and pernicious mode of ful- 
filling it could be devised than that enjoined by this 
bill. Curacies are not granted for the life of the cu- 
rate ; but for the life or incumbency or good-liking of 
the rector. It is only rectors worth 500Z. a-year who 
are compelled by Mr. Perceval to come down with a 
fifth to their deputy ; and these form but a very small 
proportion of the whole non-resident rectors ; so that 
ihe great multitude of curates must remain as poor as 
formerly,— and probably a little more discontented. 
Suppose, however, that one has actually entered on 
the enjoyment of 250lper annum. His wants, and his 
habits ol expense are enlarged by this increase of in- 

* The first unfortunately make the laws. 



come. In a year or two his rector dies, or exchargea 
his living ; and the poor man is reduced, by the effects 
of comparison, to a much worse state than before the 
operation of the bill. Can any person say that this is 
a wise and effectual mode of ameliorating the condi- 
tion of the lower clergy ? To us it almost appears to 
be invented 'for the express purpose of destroying 
those habits of economy and caution, which are so in- 
dispensably necessary to their situation. If it is urg- 
ed that the curate, knowing his wealth only to be tem- 
porary, will make use of it as a means of laying up a 
fund for some future day, — we admire the good sense 
of the man : but what becomes of all the provisions of 
the bill ? what becomes of that opulence which is to 
confer respectability upon all around it, and to radiate 
even upon the curates of Wales ? The money was 
expressly given to blacken his coat, — to render him 
convex and rosy, — to give him a sort of pseudo-recto- 
rial appearance, and to dazzle the parishioners at the 
rate of 2501. per annum. The poor man, actuated by 
those principles of common sense which are so con- 
trary to all the provisions of the bill, chooses to make 
a good thing of it, because he knows it will not last-, 
wears his old coat, rides his lean horse, and defrauds 
the class of curates of all the advantages which they 
were to derive from the sleekness and splendour of his 
appearance. 

It is of some importance to the welfare of a parish, 
and the credit of the church, that the curate and his 
rector should live upon good terms together. Such a 
bill, however, throws between them elements of mis- 
trust and hatred, which must render their agreement 
highly improbable. The curate would be perpetually 
prying into every little advance which the rector made 
upon his tithes, and claiming his proportionate in- 
crease. No respectable man could brook such inqui- 
sition ; some, we fear, would endeavour to prevent its 
effects by clandestine means. The church would be a 
perpetual scene of disgraceful animosities ; and the 
ears of the bishop never free from the clamours of ra->' 
pacity and irritation. 

It is some slight defect in such a bill, that it does 
not proportion reward to the labour done, but to the 
wealth of him for whom it is done. The curate of z 
parish containing 400 persons, may be paid as muchj 
as another person who has the care of 10,000 ; for, h 1 
England, there is very little proportion between th(j 
value of a living, and the quantity of duty to be perl 
formed by its clergyman. 

The bill does not attain its object in the best way! 
Let the bishop refuse to allow of any certain curatt| 
upon a living above 500Z. per annum, who is not x} 
Master of Arts at one of the universities. Such cu# 
rates will then be obtained at a price which will renl 
der it worth the while of such men to take curacies J 
and such a degree and situation in society will secur i 
good curates much more effectually than the com 
cated provisions of this bill : for, prima facie 
pears to us much more probable, that a curate sh 
be respectable Avho is a Master of Arts in some Eng 
lish university, than if all that we knew about hir 
was, that he had a fifth of the profits of the living 
The object is, to fix a good clergyman in a parish 
The law will not trust the non-resident rector to fb 
both the price and the person ; but fixes the price, anc 
then leaves him the choice of' the person. Our plai 
is, to fix upon the description, of person, and then to. 
leave the price to find its level ; for the good price b4 
no means implies a good person, but the good personi 
will be sure to get a good price. i 

Where the living will admit of it, we have commonji 
ly observed that the English clergy are desirous of putji 
tmg in a proper substitute. If this is so, the bill i* 
unnecessary ; for it proceeds on the very contrary sup. 
position, that the great mass of opulent clergy consul] 
nothing but economy in the choice of their curates. j 

It is very galling and irksome to any class of met 
to be compeUed to disclose their private circumi 
stances ; a provision contained in and absolutely ne 
cessary to this bill, under which the diocesan car! 
always compel the minister to disclose the full valu< 
of his living. 

After all, however, the main and conclusive objecj 



secur * 

omplii 
it ap/ 
shouh* 



SOCIETY FOR THE SUPPRESSION OF VICE. 



196 



tion to the bill is, that its provisions are drawn from 
such erroneous principles, and betray such gross ig- 
norance of human nature, that though it would infalli- 
bly produce a thousand mischiefs foreseen and not 
foreseen, it would evidently have no effect whatsoever 
in raising the salaries of curates. We do not put this 
as a case of common buyer and seller ; we allow that 
the parish is a third party, having an interest ;* we 
fully admit the right of the legislature to interfere 
for their relief. We only contend, that such inter- 
ference would be necessarily altogether ineffectual, 
so long as men can be found doing the duty of cu- 
rates, and willing to do it for less than the statutory 
minimum. 

If there is a competition of rectors for curates, it is 
quite unnecessary and absurd to make laws in favour 
of curates. The demand for them will do their busi- 
ness more effectually than the law. If, on the con- 
trary (as the fact plainly is) , there is a competition 
of curates for employment, is it possible to prevent 
this order of men from labouring under the regulation 
price ( Is it possible to prevent a curate from pledg- 
ing himself to his rector, that he will accept only half 
the legal salary, if he is so fortunate as to be pre- 
ferred among an host of rivals, who are willing to en- 
gage on the same terms ? You may make these con- 
tracts illegal : What then ? Men laugh at such pro- 
hibitions ; and they always become a dead letter. In 
nine instances out of ten, the contract would be ho- 
nourably adhered to ; and then what is the use of Mr. 
Perceval's law ? Where the contract was not adhered 
to, whom would the law benefit ? — A man utterly de- 
void of every particle of honour and good faith. And 
this is the new species of curate, who is to reflect 
dignity and importance upon his poorer brethren ! 
The law encourages breach of faith between gambler 
and gambler ; it arms broker against broker ; — but it 
t cannot arm clergyman against clergyman. Did any 
': human being before, ever think of disseminating 
\ such a principle among the teachers of Christianity ? 
; Did any ecclesiastic law, before this, ever depend for 
1 its success upon the mutual treachery of men who 
-, ought to be examples to their fellow-creatures of every 
\ thing that is just and upright. 

We have said enough already upon the absurdity of 
* punishing all rich rectors for non-residence, as for a 
-presumptive delinquency. A law is already passed, 
'fixing what shall be legal and sufficient causes for 
', non-residence. Nothing can be more unjust, then, 
■than to punish that absence which you admit to be 
-j legal. If the causes of absence are too numerous, 
2 lessen them; but do not punish him who has availed 
himself of their existence. We deny, however, that 
'they are too numerous. There are 6000 livings out of 
11,000 in the English church under 80Z. per annum : 
1 many of these 201., many 301. per annum. The 
"Jwhole task of education at the university, public 
•schools, private families, and in foreign travel, de- 
volves upon the clergy. A great part of the literature 
W their country is in their hands. Residence is a very 
'proper and necessary measure ; but, considering all 
these circumstances, it requires a great deal of mode- 
ration and temper to carry it into effect, without doing 
more mischief than good. At present, however, the 
torrent sets the other way. Every lay plunderer, and 
every fanatical coxcomb, is forging fresh chains for 
the English clergy ; and we shall not be surprised, in 
a very little time, to see them absenting themselves 
from their benefices by a kind of day-rule, like pri- 
soners in the king's bench. The first bill, which was 
brought in by Sir William Scott, always saving and 
excepting the power granted to the bishops, is full of 
useful provisions, and characterized throughout by 
great practical wisdom. We have no doubt but that 
it has, upon the whole, improved the condition of the 
English church. Without caution, mildness, or infor- 
mation, however, it was peculiarly unfortunate to fol- 



low such a leader. We are extremely happy the bill 
was rejected. We have seldom witnessed more of 
ignorance and error stuffed and crammed into so very 
narrow a compass. Its origin, we are confident, is 
from the Tabernacle ; and its consequences would 
have been, to have sown the seeds of discord and 
treachery in an ecclesiastical constitution, which, un- 
der the care of prudent and honest men, may always 
be rendered a source of public happiness. 

One glaring omission in this bill we had almost for- 
gotten to mention. The chancellor of the exchequer 
has entirely neglected to make any provision for 
that very meritorious class of men, the lay curates, 
who do all the business of those offices, of which lazy 
and non-resident placemen receive the emoluments. 
So much delicacy and conscience, however, are here 
displayed on the subject of pocketing unearned emo- 
luments, that we have no doubt the moral irritability 
of this servant of the crown will speedily urge him to 
a species of reform, of which he may be the object as 
well as the mover. 



* We remember Horace's description of the misery of a 
parish where there is no resident clergyman. 

« Illacrymabiles 

Urgentur, ignotique longa 
Nocte, carent quia vote sacro.' 



PROCEEDINGS OF THE SOCIETY FOR THE 
SUPPRESSION OF VICE. (Edinburgh Review, 
1809.) 

Statement of the Proceedings of the Society for the Suppres- 
sion of Vice, from July 9 to November 1'2, read at their Ge- 
neral Meeting, held November 12, 1804. With an Appendix, 
containing the Plan of the Society, fyc, fyc, fyc. London, 
1804. 

An Address to the Public from the Society for the Suppression 
of Vice, instituted in London, 1802. Part the Second. 
Containing an Account of the Proceedings of the Society 
from its original Institution. London. 1804. 

A Society that holds out as its object the suppres- 
sion of vice, must at first sight conciliate the favour of 
every respectable person ; and he who objects to an 
institution calculated apparently to d# so much good, 
is bound to give very clear and satisfactory reasons 
for his dissent from so popular an opinion. We cer- 
tainly have, for a long time, had doubts of its utility ; 
and now think ourselves called upon to state the 
grounds of our distrust. 

Though it were clear that individual informers are 
useful auxiliaries to the administration of the laws, it 
would by no means follow that these informers should 
be allowed to combine — to form themselves into a 
body — to make a public purse — and to prosecute un- 
der a common name. An informer, whether he is 
paid by the week, like the agents of this society — or 
by the crime, as in common cases — is, in general, a 
man of a .very indifferent character. So much fraud 
and deception are necessary for carrying on his trade 
— it is so odious to his fellow subjects — that no man of 
respectability will ever undertake it. It is evidently 
impossible to make such a character otherwise than 
odious. A man who receives weekly pay for prying 
into the transgressions of mankind, and bringing them 
to consequent punishment, will always be hated by 
mankind ; and the office must fall to the lot of some 
men of desperate fortunes and ambiguous character. 
The multiplication, therefore, of such officers, and the 
extensive patronage of such characters, may, by the 
management of large and opulent societies, become an 
evil nearly as great as the evils they would suppress. 
The alarm which a private and disguised accuser oc- 
casions in a neighbourhood, is knpwn to be prodigious, 
not only to the guilty, but to those who may be at 
once innocent, and ignorant, and timid. The destruc- 
tion of social confidence is another evil, the conse- 
quence of information. An informer gets access to my 
house or family — worms my secret out of me — and 
then betrays me to the magistrate. Now, all these 
evils may be tolerated in a small degree, while, in a 
greater degree, they would be perfectly intolerable. 
Thirty or forty informers roaming about the metro- 
polis, may frighten the mass of offenders a little, and 
do some good : ten thousand informers would either 
create an insurrection, or totally destroy the confi- 
dence and' cheerfulness of private life. Whatever may 



J 96 



WORKS OF THE REV. SIDNEY SMITH. 



be said, therefore, of the single and insulted informer, 
it is quite a new question Avhen we come to a corpora- 
tion of informers supported by large contributions. 
The one may be a good, the other a very serious evil ; 
the one legal, the other wholly out of the contempla- 
tion of law — which often, and very wisely, allows in- 
dividuals to do what it forbids to many individuals as- 
sembled. 

If once combination is allowed for the suppression 
of vice, where are its limits to be? Its capital may 
as well consist of 100,000Z. per annum, as of a thou- 
sand : its numbers may increase from a thousand sub- 
scribers, which this society, it seems, had reached in 
its second year, to twenty thousand: and, in that 
case, what accused person of an inferior condition of 
life would have the temerity to stand against such a 
society ? Their mandates would very soon be law ; 
and there is no compliance into which they might not 
frighten the common people, and lower orders of 
tradesmen. The idea of a society of gentlemen, call- 
ing themselves an association for the suppression of 
vice, would alarm any small offender to a degree that 
would make him prefer any submission to any resist- 
ance. He would consider the very fact of being ac- 
cused by them, as almost sufficient to ruin him. 

An individual accuser accuses at his own expense ; 
and the risk he runs is a good security that the sub- 
ject will not be harassed by needless accusations — a 
security which, of course, he cannot have against such 
a society as this, to whom pecuniary loss is an object 
of such little consequence. It must never be for- 
gotten, that this is not a society for punishing people 
who have been found to transgress the law, but for 
accusing persons of transgressing the law ; and that 
before trial, the accused person is to be considered as 
innocent, and is to have every fair chance of estab- 
lishing his innocence. He must be no commo^ defen- 
dant, however, who does not contend against such a 
society with very fearful odds ; — the best counsel en- 
gaged for his om)onents — great practice in the parti- 
cular court and particular species of cause — witnesses 
thoroughly hackneyed in a court of justice — and an 
unlimited command of money. It by no means fol- 
lows, that the legislature, in allowing individuals to 
be informers, meant to subject the accused person to 
the superior weight and power of such societies. The 
very influence of names must have a considerable 
weigh*, with the jury. Lord Dartmouth, Lord Rad- 
stock, and the Bishop of Durham, versus a White- 
chapel butcher or a publican ! Is this a fair contest 
before a jury ? It is not so even in London; and what 
must it be in the country, where a society for the sup- 
pression of vice may consist of all the principal per- 
sons in the neighbourhood ? These societies are now 
established in York, in Reading, and in many other 
large towns. Wherever this is the case, it is far from 
improbable that the same persons, at the Quarter or 
Town Sessions, may be both judges and accusers; 
and still more fatally so, if the offence is tried by a 
special jury. This is already most notoriously the 
case in societies for the preservation of game. They 
prosecute a poacher ; — the jury is special ; and the 
poor wretch is found guilty by the very same persons 
who have accused him. 

If it is lawful for respectable men to combine for 
the purpose of turning informers, it is lawful for the 
lowest and most despicable race of informers to do the 
same thing; and then it is quite clear that every 
species of wickedness and extortion would be the con- 
sequence. We are rather surprised that no society of 
•perjured attorneys and fraudulent bankrupts has risen 
up in this metropolis, for the suppression of vice. A 
chairman, deputy-chairman, subscriptions, and an an- 
nual sermon would give great dignity to their pro- 
ceedings ; and they would soon begin to take some 
rank in the world. 

It is true that it is the duty of grand juries to inform 
against vice ; but the law knows the probable number 
«f grand jurymen, the times of their meeting, and* the 
description of persons of whom they consist. Of volun- 
tary societies it can know nothing — their numbers, 
their wealth, or the character of their members. It 
may therefore trust to a grand jury what it would by 



no means trust to an unknown combination A vast I 
distinction is to be made, too, between official duties 
and voluntary duties. The first are commonly carried 
on with calmness and moderation ; the latter often 
characterized, in their execution, by rash and intern 
perate zeal. 

The present society receives no members but those I 
who are of the Church of England. As we are now 
arguing the question generally, we have a right to 
make any supposition. It is equally free, therefore, 
upon general principles, for a society of sectarians to 
combine and exclude members of the Church of Eng- 
land ; and the suppression of vice may thus come in 
aid of Methodism, Jacobinism, or of any set of prin- 
ciples, however perilous, either to church or state. — 
The present society may, perhaps, consist of persons 
whose sentiments on these points are rational and re- 
spectable. Combinations, however, of this sort may 
give birth to something far different : and such a sup- 
position is a fair way of trying the question. 

We doubt if there be not some mischief in averting 
the fears and hopes of the people from the known and 
constituted authorities of the country to those self- 
created powers; — a society that punishes in the 
Strand, — another which rewards at Lloyd's Coffee- 
house ! If these things get to any great height, they 
throw an air of insignificance over those branches of ; 
the government to whom these cares properly de- 
volve, and whose authority is by these means assisted, 
till it is superseded. It is supposed that a project 
must necessarily be good, because it is intended for the 
aid of law and government. At this rate there should 
be a society in aid .of the government, for procuring 
intelligence from foreign parts, with accredited agents 
all over Europe. There should be a voluntary trans- 
port board, and a gratuitous victualling office. There 
should be a duplicate, in short, of every department 
of the state, — the one appointed by the king, and the 
other by itself. There should be a real Lord Glenber- 
vie in the woods and forests, — and with him a mon- 
ster, a voluntary Lord Glenbervie, serving without 
pay, and guiding gratis, with secret counsel, the axe of 
his prototype. If it be asked, who are the constituted 
authorities who are legally appointed to watch over 
morals, and whose functions the society usurp ? our 
answer is, that there are in England about 12,000 cler- 
gy, not unhandsomely paid for persuading the people, 
and about 4000 justices, 30 grand juries, and 40,000 
constables, whose duty and whose inclination it is to 
compel them to do right. Under such circumstances, 
a voluntary moral society does indeed seem to be the 
purest result of volition ; for there certainly is not the 
smallest particle of necessity mingled with its exis- 
tence. 

It is hardly possible that a society for the suppres- 
sion of vice can ever be kept within the bounds of : 
good sense and moderation. If there are many mem- 
bers who have really become so from a feeling of 
duty, there will necessarily be some who enter the so' 
ciety to hide a bad character, and others whose ob- 
ject it is to recommend themselves to their betters by a 
sedulous and bustling inquisition into the immoralities 
of the public. • The loudest and noisiest suppressors 
will always carry it against the more prudent part of 
the community ; the most violent will be considered 
as the most moral ; and those who see the absurdity 
will, from the fear of being thought to encourage vice 
be reluctant to oppose it. 

It is of great importance to keep public opinion on i 
the side of virtue. To their authorized and legal cor- 
rectors, mankind are, on common occasions, ready 
enough to submit ; but there is something in the self- 
erection of a voluntary magistracy which creates so 
much disgust, that it almost renders vice popular, and 
puts the offence at a premium. We have no doubt 
but that the immediate effect of a voluntary combina- 
tion for the suppression of vice, is an involuntary com- 
bination in favour of the vices to be suppressed ; ana* I 
this is a very serious drawback from any good of: 
which such societies may be the occasion ; for the 
state of morals, at any one period, depends much more 
upon opinion than law ; ana to bring odious and dis 
gusting auxiliaries to the aid of virtue! is to do the ut» • 



SOCIETY FOR THE SUPPRESSION OF VICE. 



19? 



most possible good to the cause of vice. We regret, 
that mankind are as they are ; and we sincerely wish 
that the species at large were as completely devoid of 
every vice and infirmity as the president, vice-presi- 
dent and committee of the suppressing society; bat, 
till they are thus regenerated, it is of the greatest con- 
sequent to teach them virtue and religion in a manner 
which will not make them hate both the one and the 
other. The greatest delicacy is required in the appli- 
cation of violence to moral and religious sentiment. — 
We forget that the object is, not to produce the out- 
ward compliance, but to raise up the inward feeling, 
which secures the outward compliance. You may drag 
men into church by main force, and prosecute them 
for buying a pot of beer, — and cut them off from the 
enjoyment of a leg of mutton ; — and you may do all 
this, till you make the common people hate Sunday, 
and the clergy, and religion, and every thing that re 
lates to such subjects. There are many crimes, in 
deed, where persuasion cannot be waited for, and 
where the untaught feelings of all men go along with 
the violence of the law. A robber and a murderer 
must be knocked on the head like mad dogs ; but we 
have no great opinion of the possibility of indicting 
men into piety, or of calling in the quarter sessions to 
the aid of religion. You may produce outward con 
formity by these means ; but you are so far from pro- 
ducing (the only thing worth producing) the inward 
feeling, that you incur a great risk of giving birth to a 
totally opposite sentiment. 

The violent modes of making men good, just allud- 
ed to, have been resorted to at periods when the science 
of legislation was not so well understood as it now is ; 
or when the manners of the age have been peculiarly 
gloomy or fanatical. The improved knowledge, and 
the improved temper of later times, push such laws 
into the back ground, and silently repeal them. A 
suppressing society, hunting every where for penalty 
and information, has a direct tendency to revive an- 
cient ignorance and fanaticism, — and to re-enact laws 
which, if ever they ought to have existed at all, were 
certainly calculated for a very different style of man- 
ners, and a very different degree of intormation. To 
compel men to go to church, under a penalty, appears 
to us to be absolutely absurd. The bitterest enemy of 
religion will necessarily be that person who is driven 
to a compliance with its outward ceremonies, by in- 
formers and justices of the peace. In the same man- 
ner, any constable who hears another swear an oath, 
has a right to seize him, and carry him before a ma- 
gistrate, where he is to be fined so much for each exe- 
cration. It is impossible to carry such laws into exe- 
cution : and it is lucky that it is impossible, — for their 
execution would create an infinitely greater evil than 
it attempted to remedy. The common sense and 
common feeling of mankind, if left to themselves, 
would silently repeal such laws ; and it is one of the 
evils of these societies, that they render absurdity 
eternal, and ignorance indestructible. Do not let us 
be misunderstood: upon the object to be accomplish- 
ed, there can be but one opinion ; — it is only upon the 
means employed, that there can be the slightest dif- 
ference of sentiment. To goto church is a duty of 
the greatest possible importance ; and on the blasphe- 
my and vulgarity of swearing, there can be but one 
opinion. But such duties are not the objects of legis- 
lation ; they must be left to the general state of pub- 
lic sentiment ; which sentiment must be influenced by 
example, by the exertions of the pulpit and the press, 
and, above all, by education. The fear of God can 
never be taught by constables, nor the pleasures of re- 
ligion be learnt from a common informer. 

Beginning with the best intentions in the world, 
6uch societies must, in all probability, degenerate into 
a receptacle for every species of tittle-tattle, imperti- 
nence, and malice. Men, whose trade is rat-catching, 
love to catch rats ; the bug-destroyer seizes on his 
bug with delight ; and the suppressor is gratified by 
finding his vice. The last soon becomes a mere 
tradesman like the others ; none of them moralize, or 
lament that their respective evils should exist in the 
world. The public feeling is swallowed up in the pur- 
suit of a daily occupation, and in the display of a 



technical skill. Here, then, is a society of men. who 
invite accusation, — who receive it (almost unknown 
to themselves) with pleasure, — and who, if they hate 
dulness and inoccupation, can have very little pleasure 
in the innocence ot their fellow-creatures. The natu- 
ral consequence of all this is, that (besides that por- 
tion of rumour which every member contributes at the 
weekly meeting), their table must be covered with an- 
nonymous lies against the characters of individuals. 
Every servant discharged from his master's service, 
—every villain who hates the man he has injured,— 
every cowardly assassin of character, — now knows 
where his accusation will be received, and where they 
cannot fail to produce some portion of the mischiev- 
ous effects which he wishes. The very first step of 
such a society should be, to declare, in the plainest 
manner, that they would never receive any anonymous 
accusation. This would be the only security to the 
public, that they were not degrading themselves into 
a receptacle for malice and falsehood. Such a decla- 
ration would inspire some species of confidence ; and 
make us believe that their object was neither the love 
of power, nor the gratification of uncharitable feelings. 
The society for the suppression, however, have done 
no such thing. They request, indeed, the signature 
of the informers whom they invite ; but they do not 
(as they ought) make that signature an indispensa- 
ble condition. 

Nothing has disgusted us so much in the proceedings 
of this society, as the control which they exercise over 
the amusements of the poor. One of the specious titles 
under which this legal meanness is gratified is, Pre- 
vention of Cruelty to Animals. 

Of cruelty to animals, let the reader take the follow- 
ing specimens : 

Running an iron hook in the intestines of an animal ; 
presenting this first animal to another as his food ; and 
then pulling this second creature up, and suspending 
him by the barb in his stomach. 

Riding a horse till he drops, in order to see an inno- 
cent animal torn to pieces by the dogs. 

Keeping a poor animal upright for many weeks, to 
communicate a peculiar hardness to his flesh. 

Making deep incisions into the flesh of another ani- 
mal, while living, in order to make the muscles more 
firm. 

Immersing another animal, while living, in hot wa- 
ter. , 

Now we do fairly admit that such abominable cru- 
elties as these, are worthy of the interference of the 
law : and that the society should have punished them, 
cannot be matter of surprise to any feeling mind. But 
stop, gentle reader ! these cruelties are the cruelties 
of the suppressing committee, not of the poor. You 
must not think of punishing these. The first of these 
cruelties passes under the pretty name of angling; 
and therefore there can be no harm in it — the more 
particularly as the president himself has one of the 
best preserved trout streams in England. The next 
is hunting : and as many of the vice-presidents and of 
the committee hunt, it is not possible there can be any 
cruelty in hunting.* The next is, a process for making 
brawn — a dish never tasted by the poor, and therefore 
not to be disturbed by indictment. The fourth is the 
mode of crimping cod ; and the fifth of boiling lob- 
sters — all high-life cruelties, with which a justice of 
the peace has no business to meddle. The real thing 
which calls forth the sympathies, and harrows up the 
soul, is to see a number of boisterous artisans baiting 
a bull, or a bear ; not a savage hare, or a carnivorous 
stag — but a poor, innocent, timid bear — not pursued 
by magistrates, and deputy lieutenants, and men of 

* ' How reasonable creatures' (says the society) ' can en- 
joy a pastime which is the cause of such sufferings to brute 
animals, or how they can consider themselves entitled, for 
their own amusement, to stimulate those animals, by means 
of the antipathies which Providence has thought proper to 
place between them, to worry and tear and often to destroy 
each other, it is difficult to conceive. So inhuman a prac 
tice, by a retribution peculiarly just, tends obviously to ren 
der the human character brutal and ferocious,' &c, &c. 
{Address, p. 71, 72.) We take it for granted, that the reader 
sees clearly that no part of this description can possibly ap- 
ply to the case of hunting. 



WOR£S OF THE REV. SIDNEY SMITH. 



I9S 

education, but by those who must necessarily seek 
their relaxation in noise and tumultuous merriment — 
by men whose feelings are blunted, and whose under- 
standing is wholly devoid of refinement. The society 
detail, with symptoms of great complacency, their 
detection of a bear-baiting in Blackboy Alley, Chick 
Lane, and the prosecution of the offenders before a 
magistrate. It appears to us, that nothing can be 
more partial and unjust than this kind of proceedings. 
A man of ten thousand a-year may worry a fox as 
much as he pleases — may encourage the breed of a 
mischievous animal, on purpose to worry it ; and a 
poor labourer is carried before a magistrate for paying 
sixpence to see an exhibition of courage between. a 
dog and a bear ! And cruelty may be practised to 
gorge the stomachs of the rich — none to enliven the 
holidays of the poor. We venerate those feelings 
which really protect creatures susceptible of pain, and 
incapable of complaint. But heaven-born pity, now- 
a-days, calls for the income tax, and the court guide ; 
and ascertains the rank and fortune of the tormentor 
before she weeps for the pain of the suflerer. It is 
astonishing how the natural feelings of mankind are 
distorted by false theories. Nothing can be more 
mischievous than to say, that the pain inflicted by the 
dog of a man of quality is not (when the strength of 
the two animals is the same) equal to that produced 
by the cur of a butcher. Haller, in his Pathology, 
expressly says, that the animal bitten knows no differ- 
ence in the quality of the biting animaVs master ; and 
it is now the universal opinion among all enlightened 
men, that the misery of the brawner would be very 
little diminished, if he could be made sensible that he 
was to be eaten up only by persons of the first fashion. 
The contrary supposition seems to us to be absolute 
nonsense ; it is the desertion of the true Baconian phi- 
losophy, and the substitution of mere unsupported 
conjecture in its place. The trespass, however, which 
calls forth all the energies of a suppressor, is the sound 
of a fiddle. That the common people are really enjoy- 
ing themselves, is now beyond all doubt : and away 
rush secretary, president, and committee, to clap the 
cotillion into the compter, and to bring back the life 
of the poor to its regular standard of decorous gloom. 
The gambling houses of St. James's remain untouch- 
ed. The peer ruins himself and his family with impu- 
nity ; while the Irish labourer is privately whipped for 
not making a better use of the excellent moral and 
religious education which he has received in the days 
of his youth. 

It is not true, as urged by the society, that the vices 
of the poor are carried on in houses of public resort, 
and those of the rich in their own houses. The socie- 
ty cannot be ignorant of the innumerable gambling- 
houses resorted to by men of fashion. Is there one 
they have suppressed, or attempted to suppress ? 
Can anything be more despicable than such distinc- 
tions as these ? Those who make them seem to have for 
other persons' vices all the rigor of the ancient Puritans 
— without a particle of their honesty, or their courage. 
To suppose that any society will attack the vices of 
people of fashion, is wholly out of the question. It 
the society consisted of tradesmen, they would infalli- 
bly be turned off by the vicious customers whose plea- 
sures they interrupted : and what gentleman so fond 
of suppressing as to interfere with the vices of good 
company, and inform against persons who were really 
genteel? He knows very well that the conseqence of 
such interference would be a complete exclusion from 
elegant society ; that the upper classes could not and 
woidd not endure it ; and that he must immediately 
lose his rank in the world, if his zeal subjected fash- 
ionable offenders to the slightest inconvenience from 
the law. Nothing, therefore, remains, but to rage 
against the Sunday dinners of the poor, and to prevent 
a bricklayer's labourer from losing, on the Seventh 
day, that beard which has been augmenting the other 
six. We see at the head of this society the names of 
several noblemen, and of other persons moving in the 
fashionable world. Is it possible they can be igno- 
rant of the innumerable offences against the law and 
morality which are committed by their own acquaint- 
ances and connections ? Is there one single instance 



where they have directed the attention of the society 
to this higher species of suppression, and sacrificed 
men of consideration to that zeal for virtue which 
watches so acutely over the vices of the poor ? It 
would give us very little pleasure to see a duchess 
sent to the Poultry compter ; but if we saw the socie- 
ty flying at such high game, we would at least say 
they were honest and courageous, whatever judgment 
we may form of their good sense. At present they 
should denominate themselves a society for suppress- 
ing the vices of persons whose income does not exceed 
£500 per annum ; and then, to put all classes upon 
an equal footing, there must be another society of bar- 
bers, butchers, and bakers, to return to the higher 
classes that moral character by which they are so 
highly benefited. 

To show how impossible it is to keep such societies 
within any kind of bounds, we shall quote a passage 
respecting circulating libraries, from their proceedings. 

* Your committee have good reasons for believing, that 
the circulation of their notices among the printsellers, warn- 
ing them against the sale or exhibition of indecent repre- 
sentations, has produced, and continues to produce the best 
effects. 

< But they have to lament that the extended establishments 
of circulating libraries, however useful they may be, in a 
variety of respects, to the easy and general diffusion of 
knowledge, are extremely injurious to morals and religion, 
by the indiscriminate admission which, they give to works 
of a prurient and immoral nature. It is a toilsome task to 
any virtuous and enligntened mind, to wade through the 
catalogues of these collections, and much more to select 
such books from them as have only an apparent bad ten 
dency. But your committee being convinced, that their at 
tention ousht to be directed to those institutions which pos 
sess such powerful and numerous means of poisoning the 
minds of young persons, and especially of the female youth, 
have therefore begun to make some endeavours towards 
their better regulation.' — Statement of the Proceedings for 
1804, pp. 11, 12. 

In the same spirit we see them writing to a country 
magistrate in Devonshire, respecting a wake adver- 
tised in the public papers. Nothing can be more pre- 
sumptuous than such conduct, or produce, in the minds 
of impartial men, a more decisive impression against 
the society. 

The natural answer from the members of the socie- 
ty (the only ansAver they have ever made to the ene- 
mies of their institution) will be, that we are lovers of 
vice, — desirous of promoting indecency, of destroying 
the Sabbath, and of leaving mankind to the unre- 
strained gratification of their passions. We have only 
very calmly to reply, that we are neither so stupid 
nor so wicked as not to concur in- every scheme which 
has for its object the preservation of rational religion 
and sound morality : — but the scheme must be well 
concerted, — and those who are to carry it into execu- 
tion must deserve our confidence, from their talents 
and their character. Upon religion and morals de- 
pends the happiness of mankind ; — but the fortune of 
knaves and the power of fools are sometimes made to 
rest on the same apparent basis ; and we will jaever (it 
we can help it) allow a rogue to get rich, or a block- 
head to get powerful, under the sanction of these awful 
words. We do not by any means intend to apply 
these contemptuous epithets to the Society for the Sup- 
pression. That there are among their number some 
very odious hypocrites, is not impossible ; that many 
men who believe they come there from the love of 
virtue, do really join the society from the love of 
power, we do not doubt : but we see no reason to 
doubt that the great mass of subscribers consist of 
persons who have very sincere intentions of doing 
good. That they have, in some instances, done a 
great deal of good, we admit with the greatest plea- 
sure. We believe that in the hands of truly honest, 
intrepid, and, above all, discreet men, such a society 
might become a valuable institution, improve in some 
degree the public morals, and increase the public hap- 
piness. So many qualities, however, are required to 
carry it on well, — the temptations to absurdity and 
impertinence are so very great, — that we ever despair 
of seeing our wishes upon this subject realized. In 
the present instance, our object has been to suppress 
the arrogance of suppressors, — to keep them within 



CHARACTERS OF FOX 



199 



due bounds— to show them that to do good requires a I nions. But when the attorney-general for the time 
little more talent and reflection than they are aware being ingratiates himself with the court, by nibbling 
of,— and above all, to impress upon them that true I at this valuable privilege of the people, it is very easy 



zeal for virtue knows no distinction between the rich 
and the poor ; and that the cowardly and the mean 
can never be the true friends of morality, and the pro- 
moters of human happiness. If they attend to these 
rough doctrines, they will ever find in the writers of 
this journal their warmest admirers, and their most 
sincere advocates and friends. 



CHARACTERS OF FOX. (Edinburgh Review, 
1809.) 

Characters of the late Charles James Fox. By Philopatris 
Varvicensis., 2 vols. 8vo. 

This singular work consists of a collection of all 
the panegyrics passed upon Mr. Fox, after his de- 
cease, in periodical publications, speeches, sermons, 
or elsewhere, — in a panegyric upon Mr. Fox by Philo- 
patris himself,— and in a volume of notes by the said 
Philopatris upon the said panegyric. 

Of ihe panegyrics, that by Sir James Mackintosh 
appears to us to be by far the best. It is remarkable 
for good sense, acting upon a perfect knowledge of his 
subject, for simplicity, and for feeling. Amid the 
languid or turgid efforts of mediocrity, it is delightful 
to notice the skill, attention, and resources of a supe- 
rior man, — of a man, too, who seems to feel what he 
v. rites, — who does not aim at conveying his meaning 
in rhetorical and ornamented phrases, but who uses 
plain words to express strong sensations. We cannot 
help wishing, indeed, that Sir James Mackintosh had 
been more diffuse upon the political character of Mr. 
Fox, the great feature of whose life was the long 
and unwearied opposition which he made to the low 
cunning, the profligate extravagance, the sycophant 
mediocrity, and the stupid obstinacy of the English 
court. 

To estimate the merit and the difficulty of this op- 
position, we must remember the enormous influence 
which the crown, through the medium of its patron- 
age, exercises in the remotest corners of the kingdom, 
—the number of subjects whom it pays,— the much 
greater number whom it keeps in a state of expecta- 
tion, — and the ferocious turpitude of those mercena- 
ries whose present prospects and future hopes are 
threatened by honest, and exposed by eloquent men. 
It is the easiest of all things, too, in this country, to 
make Englishmen believe that those who oppose the 
government wish to ruin the country. The English 
are a very busy people ; and, with all the faults of 
their governors, they are still a very happy people. 
They have, as they ought to have, a perfect confi- 
dence in the administration of justice. The rights 
which the different classes of men exercise the one 
over the other are arranged upon equitable principles. 
Life, liberty and property are protected from the vio- 
lence and caprice of power. The visible and imme- 
diate stake, therefore, for whxh politicians play, is 
not large enough to attract the notice of the people, 
and to call them off from their daily occupations, to 
investigate thoroughly the character and motives of 
men engaged in the business of legislation. The peo- 
ple can oiily understand, and attend to the last results 
of a long series of measures. They are impatient of 
the details which lead to these results ; and it is the 
easiest of all things to make them believe that those 
who insist upon such details are actuated only by fac- 
tious motives. We are all now groaning under the 
weight of taxes : but how often was Mr. Fox followed 
by the curses of his country for protesting against the 
two wars which have loaded us with these taxes? — 
the one of which wars has made America independ- 
ent, and the other rendered France omnipotent. The 
case is the same with all the branches of public liber- 
ty. If the broad and palpable question were, whether 
every book which issues from the press should be sub- 
jected to the license of a general censor, it would be 
impossible to blacken the character of any man who, 



to treat hostility to his measures as a minute and fn 
volous opposition to the government, and to persuade 
the mass of mankind that it is so. In fact, when a 
nation has become free, it is extremely difficult to per- 
suade them that their freedom is only to be preserved 
by perpetual and minute jealousy. They do not ob- 
serve that there is a constant, perhaps an unconscious, 
effort on the part of their governors, to diminish, and 
so ultimately to destroy, that freedom. They stupid- 
ly imagine that what is, will always be ; and, con- 
tented with the good they have already gained, are 
easily persuaded to suspect and vilify those friends — 
the object of whose life it is to preserve that good, 
and to increase it. 

It was the lot of Mr. Fox to fight this battle for the 
greater part of his life; in the course of which time 
he never was seduced by the love of power, wealth, 
nor popularity, to sacrifice the'happiness of the many 
to the interests of the few. He rightly thought, that 
kings, and all public officers, were instituted only for 
the good of those over whom they preside ; and he 
acted as if this conviction was always present to his 
mind ; disdaining and withstanding that idolatrous 
tendency of mankind, by which they so often not on- 
ly suffer, but invite ruiu from that power which they 
themselves have wisely created for their own happi- 
ness. He loved, too, the happiness of his country- 
men more than their favour; and while others were 
exhausting the resources, by flattering the ignorant 
prejudices and foolish passions of the country, Mr. 
Fox was content to be odious to the people, so long as 
he could be useful also. It will be long before we 
witness again such pertinacious opposition to the 
alarming power of the crown, and to the follies of our 
public measures, the necessary consequence of that 
power. That such opposition should ever be united 
again with such e...raordinary talents, it is perhaps, 
in vain to hope. 

One little exception to the eulogium of Sir James 
Mackintosh upon Mr. Fox, we cannot help making. 
We are no admirers of Mr. Fox's poetry. His Vers 
de Societe appears to us flat and insipid. To write 
verses was the only thing which Mr. Fox ever at- 
tempted to do, without doing it well. In that single 
instance he seems to have mistaken his talent. 

Immediately after the collection of panegyrics 
which these volumes, contain, follows the eulogium 
of Mr. Fox by Philopatris himself: and then a volume 
of notes upon a variety of topics which this eulogium 
has suggested. Of the laudatory talents of this War- 
wickshire patriot, we shall present our readers with a 
specimen. 

' Mr. Fox, though not an adept in the use of political 
wiles, was v^ery unlikely to be the dupe of them. He was 
conversant in the ways ot man, as well as in the contents 
of hooks. He was acquainted with the peculiar language 
of states, their peculiar forms, and the grounds and effects 
of their peculiar usages. From his earliest youth, he had 
investigated the science of politics in the greater and the 
smaller scale; he had studied it in the records of history, 
both popular and rare — in the conferences of ambassadors — 
in the archives of royal cabinets — in the minuter detail of 
memoirs — and in collected or straggling anecdotes of the 
wrangles, intrigues, and cabals, which, springing up in the 
secret recesses of courts, shed their baneful influence on 
the determinations of sovereigns, the fortune of favourites, 
and the tranquillity of kingdoms. But that statesmen of 
all ages, like priests of all religions, are in all respects alike, 
is a doctrine the propagation of which he left, as an inglori- 
ous privilege, to the misanthrope, to the recluse, to the 
factious incendiary, and to the unlettered multitude. For 
himself, he thought it no very extraordinary stretch of 
penetration or charity, to admit that human nature is every 
where nearly as capable of emulation in good, as in evil. 
He boasted of no very exalted heroism, in opposing the 
calmness and firmness of conscious integrity to the shuffling 
and slippery movements, the feints in retreat, and feints in. 
advance, the dread of being over-reached, or detected in 
attempts to over-reach, and all the other humiliating and 
mortifying anxieties of the most accomplished proficients 
in the art of diplomacy. He reproached himself for no 
guilt, when he endeavoured to obtain that respect and con- 
fidence which the human heart unavoidably feels in its 



so called upon, defended the liberty of publishing opi- intercourse with persons who neither wound our pride, nor 



200 



WORKS OFTHE REV. SIDNEY SMITH. 



take aim at our happiness, in a war of hollow and ambigu- 
ous words. He was sensible of no weakness in believing 
tbat politicians who, after all, "know only as tbey are 
known," may, like otber human beings, be at first the in- 
voluntary creatures of circumstances, and seem incorrigible 
from the want of opportunities or incitements to correct 
themselves; that, bereft of the pleas usually urged in vin- 
dication of deceit, by men who are fearful of being de- 
ceived, they, in their official dealings with him, would not 
wantonly lavish the stores they had laid up for huckstering 
in a traffic, which, ceasing to be profitable, would begin to 
be infamous ; and that, possibly, here and there, if encour- 
aged by example, they might learn to prefer the shorter 
process, and surer results of plain dealing, to the delays, 
the vexations, and the uncertain or transient success, both 
of old-fashioned and new-fangled chicanery.'— (1. 209—211.) 

It is impossible to read this singular book without 
being everywhere struck with the lofty and honourable 
feelings, the enlightened benevolence, and sterling 
honesty with which it abounds. Its author is every- 
where the circumspect friend of those moral and reli- 
gious principles upon which the happiness of society 
rests. Though he is never timid, nor prejudiced, nor 
bigoted, his piety, not prudish and full of antiquated 
and affected tricks, presents itself with an earnest as- 
pect, and in a manly form ; obedient to reason, prone 
to investigation, and dedicatee! to honest purposes. — 
The writer, a clergyman, speaks of himself as a very 
independent man, who has always expressed his opin- 
ions without any fear of consequences, or any hope of 
bettering his condition. We sincerely believe he 
speaks the truth ; and revere him for the life he has 
led. Political independence — discouraged enough in 
these times among all classes of men — is sure, in the 
timid profession of the church, to doom a man to eter- 
nal poverty and obscurity. 

There are occasionally, in Philopatris, a great vigour 
of style and felicity of expression. His display of 
classical learning is quite unrivalled — his reading vari- 
ous and good : and we may observe, at intervals, a 
talent for wit, of which he might have' availed himself 
to excellent purpose, had it been compatible with the 
dignified style in which he generally conveys his sen- 
timents. With all these excellent qualities of head 
and heart, Ave have seldom met with a writer more full 
of faults than Philopatris. There is an event recorded 
in the Bible, which men who write books should keep 
constantly in their remembrance. It is there set forth, 
that many centuries ago. the earth was covered with 
a great flood, by which the whole of the human race, 
with the exception of one family, were destroyed. It 
appears also, that from thence, a* great alteration was 
made in the longevity of mankind, who, from a range 
of seven or eight hundred years, which they enjoyed 
before the flood, were confined to their present period 
of seventy or eighty years. This epoch in the history 
of man gave birth to the twofold division of the ante- 
diluvian and the postdiluvian style of writing, the lat- 
ter of which naturally contracted itself into those in- 
ferior limits which were better accommodated to the 
abridged duration of human life and literary labour. — 
Now, to forget this event, — to write without the fear 
of the deluge before his eyes, and to handle a subject 
as if mankind could lounge over a pamphlet for' ten 
years, as before their submersion, — is to be guilty of 
the most grievous error into which a writer can possi- 
bly fall. The author of this hook should call in the 
aid of some brilliant pencil, and cause the distressing 
scenes of the deluge to be portrayed in the most lively 
colours for his use. He should gaze at Noah and be 
brief. The ark should constantly remind him of the 
little time there is left for reading ; and he should 
learn, as they did in the ark, to crowd a great deal of 
matter into a very little compass. 

Philopatris must not only condense what he says in 
a narrower compass, but he must say it in a more nat- 
ural manner. Some persons can neither stir hand nor 
foot without making it clear that they are thinking of 
themselves, and laying little traps for approbation. In 
the course of two long volumes, the Patriot of War- 
wick is perpetually studying modes and postures : — the 
subject is the second consideration, and the mode of 
expression the first. Indeed, whole pages together 
seem to be mere exercises upon the English language, 
to evince the copiousness of our synonymes and to 



show the various methods in which the parts of speech 
can be marshalled and arrayed. This, which would 
be tiresome in the ephemeral productions of a newspa- 
per, is intolerable in two closely printed volumes. 

Again, strange as it may appear to this author to 
say so, he must not fall into the frequent mistake of 
rural politicians, by supposing that the understandings 
of all Europe are occupied with him and his opinions. 
His ludicrous self-importance is perpetually destroying 
the effect of virtuous feeling and just observation, 
leaving his readers with a disposition to laugh, where 
they might otherwise learn and admire. 

< I have been asked, why, after pointing out by name the 
persons who seemed to me most qualified for reforming our 
penal Code, I declined mentioning such ecclesiastics as might 
with propriety be employed in preparing for the use of the 
churches a grave and impressive discourse on the authority 
of human laws ; and as other men may ask the same ques- 
tion which my friend did, I have determined, after some 
deliberation, to insert the substance of my answer in this 
place. 

' If the public service of our church should ever be di- 
rectly employed in giving effect to the sanctions of our 
penal code, the office of drawing up such a discourse as I 
have ventured to recommend would, I suppose, be assigned 
to more than one person. My ecclesiastical superiors will, 
I am sure, make a wise choice. But they will hardly con- 
demn me for saying, that the best sense expressed in the 
best language may be expected from the Bishops of Landarf, 
Lincoln, s*. David's, Cloyne, and Norwich, the Dean of 
Christ Church, and the President of Magdalen College, 
Oxford. I mean not to throw the slightest reproach upon 
other dignitaries whom I have not mentioned. But I 
should imagine that few of my enlightened contemporaries 
hold an opinion different from my own, upon the masculine 
understanding of a Watson, the sound judgment of a Tom 
lin, the extensive erudition of a Burgess, the exquisite taste 
and good nature of a Bennet, the calm and enlightened 
benevolence of a Bathurst, the various and valuable attain 
ments of a Cyril Jackson, or the learning, wisdom, integrity, 
and piety of a Martin Ruth.' — (pp. 524 — 525.) 

In the name of common modesty, what coidd it have 
signified whether this author had given a list of eccle 
siasticts whom he thought qualified to preach about 
human laws ? what is his opinion worth '{ who called 
for it ? who wanted it ? how many millions wili be in- 
fluenced by it ? — and who, oh gracious Heaven ! who 
are a Burgess, — a Tomlin, — a Dennet, — a Cyril Jack- 
son,— a Martin Routh ? — A Tom, — a Jack, — a Harry, 
— a Peter ' All good men enough in their generation 
doubtless they are. But what have they done for the 
broad a ? what has any one of them perpetrated, which 
will make him be remembered, out of the sphere of his 
private virtues, six months after his decease ? Surely, 
scholars and gentlemen can drink tea with each other, 
and eat bread and butter, without all this laudatory 
crackling. 

Philopatris has employed a great deal of time upon 
the subject of, capital punishments, and has evinced a 
great deal of very laudable tenderness and humanity in 
discussing it. We are scarcely,, however, converts to 
that system which woidd totally abolish the punish- 
ment of death. That it is much too frequently inflict- 
ed in this country, we readily admit ; but we suspect it 
will be always necessary to reserve it for the most per- 
nicious crimes. Death is the most terrible punishment 
to the common people, and therefore the most preven- 
tive. It does not perpetually dutrage the feelings of 
those who are innocent, and iikely to remain innocent, 
as would be the case from the spectacle of convict.-, 
working in the highroads and public places. Death is 
the most irrevocable punishment, which is in some 
sense a good ; for, however necessary it might be to 
inflict labour and punishment for life, it would never be 
done. Kings and legislatures would take pity after a 
great lapse of years; the punishment Avould be remit- 
ted, and its preventive efficacy, therefore, destroyed. 
We agree with Philopatris, that the executions should 
be more solemn ; but still the English are not of a very 
dramatic turn, and the thing must not be got up too 
finely. Philopatris, and Mr. Jeremy Benthan before 
him, lay a vast stress upon the promulgation of laws, 
and treat the inattention of the English government to 
this point as a serious evil. It may be so — but we do 
not happen to remember any man punished for an of- 



RIGHT HON. CHARLES JAMES FOX. 



901 



fence which he did not know to be an offence ; though 
he might not know exactly the degree in which it was 
punishable. Who are to read the laws to the people ? 
who would listen to them if they were read ? who 
would comprehend them it they listened ? In a science 
like law there must be technical phrases known ordy to 
professional men : business could not be carried on 
without them : and of what avail would it be to repeat 
such phrases to the people ? Again, what laws are to 
be repeated, and in what places ? Is a law respecting 
the number of threads on the shuttle of a Spitalfields 
weaver to be read to the corn-growers of the Isle of 
Thanet ? If not, who is to make the selection ! If 
the law cannot be comprehended by listening to the 
viva voce repetition, is the reader to explain it, and are 
there to be law lectures all over the kingdom ? The 
fact is, that the evil docs not exist. Those who are 
not likely to commit the offence soon scent out the 
newly devised punishments, and have been long tho- 
roughly acquainted with the old ones. Of the nice 
applications of the law they are indeed ignorant ; but 
they purchase the requisite skill of some man whose 
business it is to acquire it ; and so they get into less 
mischief by trusting to others than they would do if 
they pretended to inform themselves. The people, it 
is true, are ignorant of the laws ; but they are ignorant 
only of the laws that do not concern them. A poacher 
knows nothing of the penalties to which he exposes 
himself by stealing ten thousand pounds from the pub 
lie. Commissioners of public boards are unacquainted 
with all the decretals of our ancestors respecting the 
wiring of hares ; but the one pockets his extra per 
ccntage, and the other his leveret, with a perfect 
knowledge of the laws — the particular laws which it is 
his business to elude. Philopatris will excuse us for 
differing from him upon a subject where he seems to 
entertain such strong opinions. We have a real res- 
pect for all his opinions : — no man could form them 
who had not a good heart and a sound understanding. 
If we have been severe upon his style of writing, it is 
because we know his weight in the commonwealth : 
and we wish that the many young persons who justly 
admire and imitate him should be turned to the diffi- 
cult task of imitating his many excellencies, rather 
than the useless and easy one of copying his few de- 
fects. 



OBSERVATIONS ON THE HISTORICAL WORK 
OF THE RIGHT HONOURABLE CHARLES 
JAMES FOX. (Edinburgh Review, 1809.) 

Observations on the Historical Work of the Right Honourable 
Charles James Fox. By the Right Honourable George 
Rose : pp. 215. With a Narrative of the Events which oc- 
curred in the Enterprise of the Earl of Argyle in 1685. By 
Sir Patrick Hume. London, 1809. 

This is an extraordinary performance in itself; — but 
the reasons assigned for its publication are still more 
extraordinary. A person of Mr. Rose's consequence, 
incessantly occupied, as he assures us, l with official 
duties which take equally,' according to his elegant 
expression, l from the disembarrassment of the mind 
and the leisure of time,' thinks it absolutely necessary 
to explain to his country the motives which have led 
him to do so idle a thing as to write a book. He 
would not have it supposed, however, that he could be 
tempted to so questionable an act by any light or ordi- 
dinary consideration. Mr. Fox and other literary 
loungers may write from a love of fame, or a relish for 
literature ; but the official labours of Mr. Rose can only 
be suspended by higher calls. All his former publica- 
tions, he informs us, originated in ' a sense of public 
duty ;' and the present, is ' an impulse of private friend- 
ship.' An ordinary reader may, perhaps, find some 
difficulty in comprehending how Mr. Rose could be 
' impelled by private friendship' to publish a heavy 
quarto of political observations on Mr. Fox's history : 
— and for our own part, we must confess, that after 
the most diligent perusal of his long explanation, we 
do not in the least comprehend it yet. The explana- 
tion, however, which is very curious, it is our duty to 
lay before our readers. 

Mr. Rose was much patronized by the late Earl of 



Marchmont, who left him his family papers, with an 
injunction to make use of them, ' if it should ever be- 
come necessary.' Among these papers was a narra- 
tive by Sir Patrick Hume, the earl's grandfather, of 
the occurrences which befell him and his associates in 
the unfortunate expedition undertaken by the Earl of 
Argyle in 1685. Mr. Fox, in detailing a history of 
that expedition has passed a censure, as Mr. Rose 
thinks, on the character of Sir Patrick; and to obvi- 
ate the effects of that censure, he now finds it f neces- 
sary' to publish this volume. 

All this sounds very chivalrous and affectionate ; but 
we have three little remarks to make. In the first 
place, Mr. Fox passes no censure on Sir Patrick Hume. 
In the second place, this publication does by no means 
obviate the censure of which Mr. Rose complains. 
And, thirdly, it is utterly absurd, to ascribe Mr. Rose's 
part of the volume, in which Sir Patrick Hume is 
scarcely ever mentioned, to any anxiety about his re- 
putation. 

In the first place, it is quite certain that Mr. Fox 
passes no censure on Sir Patrick Hume. On the con- 
trary he says of him, that ' he had early distinguished 
himself in the cause of liberty ;' and afterwards rates 
him so very highly as to think it a sufficient reason for 
construing some doubtful points in Sir John Cochrane's 
conduct favourably, that he had always acted in con- 
junction with Sir Patrick Hume, who is proved by the 
subsequent events, and, indeed, by the whole tenour of 
his life and conduct, to have been uniformly sincere and 
zealous in the cause of his country. ,' Such is the delibe- 
rate and unequivocal testimony which Mr. Fox has 
borne to the character of this gentleman ; and such the 
historian, whose unjust censures have compelled the 
Right Honourable George Rose to indite 250 quarto 
pages, out of pure regard to the injured memory of this 
ancestor of his deceased patron. 

Such is Mr. Fox's opinion, then, of Sir Patrick 
Hume ; and the only opinion he any where gives of his 
character. With regard to his conduct, he observes, 
indeed, in one place, that he and the other gentlemen 
engaged in the enterprise appear to have paid too little 
deference to the opinion of their noble leader ; and 
narrates, in another that, at the breaking up of their 
little army, they did not even stay to reason with him, 
but crossed the Clyde with such as would follow them. 
Now, Sir Patrick's own narrative, so far from contra- 
dicting either of these statements, confirms them both 
in the most remarkable manner. There is scarcely a 
page of it that does not show the jealous and control- 
ling spirit which was exercised towards their leader ; 
and with regard to the concluding scene, Sir Patrick's 
own account makes infinitely more strongly against 
himself and Sir John Cochrane, than the general state- 
ment of Mr. Fox. So far from staying to argue with 
their general before parting with him, it appears that 
Sir Patrick did not so much as see him ; and that 
Cochrane, at whose suggestion he deserted him, had in 
a manner ordered that unfortunate nobleman to leave 
their company. The material words of the narrative 
are these : — 

' On coming down to Kilpatrick, I met Sir John (Cochrane,) 
with others accompanicing him ; who takeing mee by the hand, 
turned mee, saying, My heart, goe you with me ? Whither goe 
you, said I? Over Clide by boate, said he. — I: Wher is Ar- 
gyle? I must see him. — He: He is gone away to his owne 
countrey, you cannot see him. — I : How comes this change of 
resolution, and that wee went not together to Glasgow? — He • 
It is no time to answer questions, but I shall satisfy you after- 
ward. To the boates wee came, filled 2, and rowed over,' &c. 
— • An honest gentleman who was present ' told mee afterward 
the manner of his parting with the Erie. Argyle being in the 
roome with Sir John, the gentleman coming in, found confu- 
sion in the Erie's countenance and speach. In end lie said, 
Sir John, I pray advise mee what shall I doe ; shall I goe over 
Clide with you, or shall I goe to my owne countrey ? Sir 
John answered, My Lord, I have told you my opinion ; you 
have some Highlanders here about you ; it is best you goe to 
your owne countrey with them, for it is to no purpose for you 
to go over Clide. My lord, faire you well. Then call'd the 
gentleman, Come away, Sir ; who followed him when I met 
with him.'' — Sir P. Hume's Narrative, pp. 63, 64. 

Such are all the censures which Mr. Fox passes 
upon this departed worthy ; and cuch the contradiction 
which Mr. Rose now thinks it necessary to exhibit. It 



WORKS OF THE REV. SIDNEY SMITH. 



is very true that Mr. Fox, in the course of his narrative, 
is under the necessity of mentioning, on the credit of 
all the historians who have treated of the subject, that 
Argyle, after his capture, did express himself in terms 
of strong disapprobation both of Sir Patrick Hume and 
of Sir John Cochrane ; and said, that their ignorance 
and misconduct were, though not designedly, the chief 
cause of his failure. Mr. Fox neither adopts nor re- 
jects this sentiment. He gives his own opinion, as we 
have already seen, in terms of the highest encomium, 
on the character of Sir Patrick Hume, and merely re- 
peats the expressions of Argyle as he found them in 
Woodrow and other historians, and as he was under 
the necessity of repeating them, if he was to give any 
account of the last words of that unfortunate noble- 
man. It is this censure of Argyle, then, perhaps, and 
not any censure of Mr. Fox, that Mr. Rose intended to 
obviate by the publication before us. But, upon this 
supposition, how did the appearance of Mr. Fox's book 
constitute that necessity which compelled the tender 
conscience of Lord Marchmont's executor to give to 
the world this long-lost justification of his ancestor ? 
The censure did not appear for the first time in Mr. 
Fox's book. It was repeated during Sir Patrick's 
own life, in all the papers of the time, and in all the 
historians since. Sir Patrick lived nearly forty good 
years after this accusation of Argyle was made public ; 
and thirty-six of those years in great credit, honour, 
and publicity. If he had thought that the existence of 
such an accusation constituted a kind of moral necessity 
for the publication of his narrative, it is evident that 
he would himself have published it ; and if it was not 
necessary then, while he was alive, to suffer by the 
censure of his leader, or to profit by its refutation, it 
is not easy to understand how it should be necessary 
now, when 130 years have elapsed from the date of it, 
and the bones of its author have reposed for nearly a 
century in their peaceful and honoured monument. 

That the narrative never was published before, 
though the censure, to which it is supposed to be an 
antidote, had been published for more than a century, 
is a pretty satisfactory proof that those who were 
most interested and best qualified to judge, either did 
not consider the censure as very deadly, or the anti- 
dote as very effectual. We are very well contented 
to leave it doubtful which of these was the case ; and 
we are convinced that all the readers of Mr. Rose's 
book will agree that it is still very doubtful. Sir Pat- 
rick, in his narrative, no doubt, says that Argyle was 
extremely arrogant, self-willed, and obstinate ; but it 
is equally certain, that the earl said to him that he 
was jealous, disobedient, and untractable. Both were 
men of honour and veracity ; and, we doubt not, be- 
lieved what they said. It is even possible that both 
may have said truly; but, at this distance of time, 
and with no new evidence but the averment of one of 
the parties, it would be altogether ridiculous to pre- 
tend to decide which may have come nearest to an im- 
partial statement. Before the publication of the pre- 
sent narrative, it is plain from Woodrow, Burnet, and 
other writers, that considerable blame was generally 
laid on Argyle for his peremptoriness and obstinacy ; 
and, now that the narrative is published, it is still 
more apparent than ever that he had some ground for 
the charges he made against his officers. The whole 
tenour of it shews that they were constantly in the ha- 
bit of checking and thwarting him ; and we have al- 
ready seen that it gives a very lame and unsatisfacto- 
ry account of their strange desertion of him, when 
their fortunes appeared to be desperate. 

It is perfectly plain, therefore, we conceive, that 
the publication of Mr. Fox's book constituted nei- 
ther a necessity nor an intelligible inducement for 
the publication of this narrative ; and that the nar- 
rative, now that it is published, has no tendency 
to remove any slight shade of censure that histo- 
ry may have thrown over the temper or prudence 
of Sir Patrick Hume. But, even if all this had 
been otherwise— if Mr. Fox had, for the first time, in- 
sinuated a censure on this defunct whig, and if the 
narrative had contained the most complete refutation 
of such a censure, — this might, indeed, have account- 
ed for the publication of Sir Patrick's narrative ; but 



it could not have accounted at all for the publication 
of Mr. Rose's book — the only thing to be accounted 
for. The narrative is given as an appendix of 65 pag- 
es to a volume of upwards of 300. In publishing the 
narrative, Mr. Rose did not assume the character of 
1 an author,' and was not called upon, by the responsi- 
bility of that character, to explain to the world his 
reasons for ' submitting himself to their judgement.' 
It is only for his book, then, exclusive of the narra- 
tive, that Mr. Rose can be understood to be offering 
any apology ; and the apology he offers is, that it 
sprung from the impulse of private friendship. When 
the matter is looked into, however, it turns out, that 
though private friendship may, by a great stretch, be 
supposed to have dictated the publication of the ap- 
pendix, it can by no possibility account, or help to ac 
count, for the composition of the book. Nay, the ten- 
dency and tenour of the book are such as this ardent 
and romantic friendship must necessarily condemn. 
It contains nothing whatever in praise or in defence of 
Sir Patrick Hume ; but it contains a very keen, and 
not a very candid, attack upon his party and his prin- 
ciples. Professing to be published from anxiety to 
vindicate and exalt the memory of an insurgent revo- 
lution whig, it consists almost entirely of an attempt 
to depreciate whig principles, and openly to decry 
and vilify such of Mr. Fox's opinions as Sir Patrick 
Hume constantly exemplified in his actions. There 
never was an effect, we believe, imputed to so impro- 
bable a cause. 

Finally, we may ask, if Mr. Rose's view, in this 
publication, was merely to vindicate the memory of 
Sir Patrick Hume, why he did not put into Mr. Fox's 
hands the information which would have rendered all 
vindication unnecessary ? It was known to all the 
world, for several years, that Mr. Fox was engaged in 
the history of that period ; and if Mr. Rose really 
thought that the papers in his custody gave a differ- 
ent view of Sir Patrick's conduct from that exhibited 
in the printed authorities, was it not his duty to put 
Mr. Fox upon his guard against being misled by them, 
and to communicate to him those invaluable docu- 
ments to which he could have access in no other way ? 
Did he doubt that Mr. Fox would have candour to 
state the truth, or that he would have stated with 
pleasure any thing that could exalt the character of a 
revolution whig? Did he imagine that any statement 
of his could ever obtain equal notoriety and effect with 
a statement in Mr. Fox's history ? Or did he poorly 
withhold this information, that he might detract from 
the value of that history, and have to boast to the pub- 
lic that there was one point upon which he was better 
informed than that illustrious statesman? As to the 
preposterous apology which seems to be hinted at in 
the book itself, viz., that it was Mr. Fox's business to 
have asked for these papers, and not Mr. Rose'-, to 
have offered them, we shall only observe, that it 
stands on a point of etiquette, which would scarcely 
be permitted to govern the civilities of tradesmen's 
wives ; and that it seems not a little unreasonable to 
lay Mr. Fox under the necessity of asking for papers, 
the very existence of which he could have no reason 
to expect. This Narrative of Sir Patrick Hume has 
now lain in the archives of his family for 130 years, 
unknown and unsuspected to all but its immediate 

Eroprietor ; and, distinguished as Sir Patrick was in 
is day in Scotland, it certainly does not imply any 
extraordinary stupidity in Mr. Fox, not to know, by 
intuition, that there were papers of his existence 
which might afford him some light on the subject of 
his history. 

We may appear to have dwelt too long on these 
preliminary considerations, since the intrinsic value 
of Mr. Rose's observations certainly will not be effect- 
ed by the truth or the fallacy of the motives he has 
assigned for publishing them. It is impossible, how- 
ever, not to see that, when a writer assigns a false 
motive for his coming forward, he is commonly con- 
scious that the real one is discreditable ; and that to ex- 
pose the hollo wness of such a pretence, is to lay the 
foundation of a wholesome distrust of his general fair- 
ness and temper. Any body certainly had a right to» 
publish remarks on Mr. Fox's work — and nobody a 



RIGHT HON. CHARLES JAMES FOX. 



203 



better right than Mr. Rose ; and if he had stated open- 
ly, that all the habits and connections of his life had 
led him to wish to see that work discredited, no one 
would have been entitled to complain of his exertions 
in the cause. When he chooses to disguise this mo- 
tive, however, and to assign another which does not 
at all account for the phenomenon, we are so far from 
forgetting the existence of the other, that we are in- 
ternally convinced of its being much stronger than we 
should otherwise have suspected ; and that it is only 
dissembled, because it exists in a degree that could 
not have been decently avowed. For the same reason, 
therefore, of enabling our readers more distinctly to 
ap])reciate the intellect and temper of this right hon- 
ourable author, we must say a word or two more of 
his Introduction, before proceeding to the substance of 
his remarks. 

Besides the edifying history of his motive for wri- 
ting, we are favoured, in that singular piece, with a 
number of his opinions upon points no way connected 
with Mr. Fox or his history ; and with a copious ac- 
count of his labours and studies in all kinds of juridic- 
al and constitutional learning In order to confirm an 
opinion that a minute knowledge of our ancient history 
is not necessary to understand our actual constitution, 
he takes an unintelligible survey of the progress of our 
government, from the days of King Alfred, — and 
quotes Lord Coke, Plowden, Doomsday Book, Lord 
Ellesmere, Rymer's Fcedera, Dugdale's Origines, the 
Rolls of Parliament, Whitelock, and Abbot's Records ; 
but, above all, : a report which I made several years 
ago on the state of the records in my custody.' He 
then goes on, in the most obliging manner, to inform 
his readers that l Verto's Account of the Revolutions of 
Rome has been found very useful by persons who have 
read the Roman History ; but the best model that I 
have met with for such a work as appears to me to be 
much wanted, is a short History of Poland, which I 
translated nearly forty years ago, but did not publish ; 
the manuscript of which his majesty at the time did 
me the honour to accept ; and it probably is still in his 
majesty's library.' — Introduction, pp. xxiv. xxv. 

Truly all this is very interesting, and very much to 
the purpose : — but scarcely more so than eight or nine 
pages that follow, containing a long account of the 
conversations which Lord Marchmont had with Lord 
Boliugbroke, about the politics of Queen Anne's min- 
isters, and which Mr. Rose now gives to the world 
from his recollection of various conversations between 
himself and Lord Marchmont. He tells us, moreover, 
that accustomed as he has been to official accuracy in 
statement,' he had naturally a quick eye for mistakes 
in fact or in deduction ; — that < having Jong enjoyed 
the confidence and affectionate friendship of Mr. Pitt,' 
he has been more scrupulous than he would otherwise 
have been in ascertaining the grounds of his animad- 
versions on the work of his great rival ; — and that, 
notwithstanding all this anxiety, and the want of l dis- 
embarrassment of mind' and < leisure of time,' he has 
compiled this volume in about as many weeks as Mr. 
Fox took years to the work on which it comments ! 

For the Observations themselves, we must say that 
we have perused them with considerable pleasure — 
not certainly from any extraordinary gratification 
which we derived from the justness of the sentiments, 
or the elegance of the style, but from a certain agree- 
able surprise which we experienced on finding how 
few parts of Mr. Fox's doctrine were considered as 
vulnerable, even by Mr. Rose ; and in how large a pro- 
portion of his freest and strongest observations that 
jealous observer has expressed his most cordial con- 
currence. The Right Honourable George Rose, we 
rather believe, is commonly considered as one of the 
least whiggish or democratical of all the public char- 
acters who have lived in our times ; and he has him- 
self acknowledged, that a long habit of political oppo- 
sition to Mr. Fox had perhaps given him a stronger 
bias against his favourite doctrines than he might 
otherwise have entertained. It was, therefore, no 
slight consolation to us to find that the true principles 
of English liberty had made so great a progress in the 
Opinions of all men in upper life, as to extort such an 
ample admission of them, even from a person of Mr. 



Rose's habits and connections. As we fear, however, 
that the same justness and liberality of thinking axe 
by no means general among the more obscure retain- 
ers of party throughout the country, we think it may 
not be without its use to quote a few of the passages 
to which we have alluded, just to let the vulgar tories 
in the provinces see how much of their favourite doc- 
trines has been abjured by their more enlightened 
chief and leaders in the seat of government. 

In the first place , there are all the passages (which 
it would be useless and tedious to recite) in which the 
patriotism and public virtue of Sir P. Hume are held 
up to the admiration of posterity. Now, Sir P. Hume, 
that true and sincere lover of his country, whose ' tal- 
ents and virtues his sovereign acknowledged and re- 
warded,' and ' whose honours have been attended by 
the suffrage of his country and the approbation of good 
men,' was, even in the reign of Charles, concerned in 
designs analogous to those of Russell and Sydney ; — 
and, very soon after the accession of James, and. (as 
Mr. Rose thinks) before, that monarch had done any 
thing in the least degree blamable, rose up openly in 
arms, and endeavoured to stir up the people to over- 
throw the existing government. Even Mr. Fox hesi- 
tates as to the wisdom and the virtue of those engaged 
in such enterprises ; — and yet Mr. Rose, professing to 
see danger in that writer's excessive zeal for liberty, 
writes a book to extol the patriotism of a premature 
insurgent. 

After this, we need not quote our author's warm pan- 
egyrics on the Revolution — ' that glorious event to 
which the measures of James necessarily led,' — or on 
the character of Lord Sommers, l whose wisdom, tal- 
ents, political courage and virtue, would alone have 
been sufficient to insure the success of that measure.' 
It may surprise some of his political admirers a little 
more, however, to find him professing that he ' concurs 
with Mr. Fox as to the expediency of the bill of exclu- 
sion,' (that boldest and most decided of all whig mea- 
sures); and thinks l that the events which took place 
in the next reign afford a strong justification of the 
conduct of the promoters of that measure.' When his 
tory friends have digested that sentiment, they may 
look at his patriotic invectives against the degrading 
connection of the two last of the Stuart princes with 
the court of France ; and the ' scandalous profligacy by 
which Charles and his successor betrayed the best in- 
terests of their country for miserable stipends. There 
is something very edifying, indeed, though we should 
fear a little alarming to courtly tempers, in the warmth 
with which our author winds up his diatribe on this 
interesting subject. 'Every one,' he observes, l who 
carries on a clandestine correspondence with a foreign 
power, in matters touching the interests ot Great 
Britain, is prima facie guilty of a great moral, as well 
as political, crime. If a subject, he is a traitor to his 
king and his country ; and if a monarch he is a traitor 
to the crown which he wears, and to the empire which 
he governs. There may, by possibility, be circum- 
stances to extenuate the former ; there can be none to 
lessen our detestation of the latter.' — (pp. 149, 150.) 

Conformably to these sentiments, Mr. Rose express- 
es his concurrence with all that Mr. Fox says of the 
arbitrary and oppressive measures which distinguish- 
ed the latter part of Charles's reign ; — declares that 
' he has manifested great temperance and forbearance 
in the character which he gives of Jefferies ; — and un,~ 
derstated the enormity of the cruel and detestable pro- 
ceedings of the Scottish government, in its unheard of 
acts of power, and the miseries and persecutions 
which it inflicted ; — adrnjts that Mr. Fox's work treat- 
ed of a period l in which the tyranny of the sovereign at 
home was not redeemed by any glory or success 
abroad; — and speaks of the Revolution as the era 
' when the full measure of the monarch's tyrannical 
usurpations made resistance a duty paramount to every 
consideration of personal or public danger.' 

It is scarcely possible, we conceive, to read these, 
and many other passages whjch might be quoted 
from the work before us, without taking the author 
for a whig ; and it certainly is not easy to comprehend 
how the writer of them could quarrel with any thing 
in Mr. Fox's history, for want of deference and vener- 



204 



* WORKS OF THE REV. SIDNEY SMITH. 



ation for the monarchial part of our constitution. To 
say the truth, we have not always been able to satis- 
fy ourselves of the worthy author's consistency; and 
holding, as we are inclined to do, that his natural and 
genuine sentiments are liberal and manly, we can on- 
ly account for the narrowness and unfairness of some 
of his remarks, by supposing them to originate from 
the habits of his practical politics, and of that long 
course of opposition, in which he learned to consider 
it a duty to his party to discredit every thing that 
came from the advocate of the people. We shall now 
say a word or two on the remarks themselves, which, 
as we have already noticed, will be found to be infi- 
nitely fewer, and more insignificant, than any one, 
looking merely at the bulk of the volume, could pos- 
sibly have conjectured. 

The first, of any sort of importance, is made on 
those passages in which Mr. Fox calls the execution 
of the king ' a far less violent measure than that of 
Lord Strafford ;' and says, l that there was something 
in the splendour and magnanimity of the act, which 
has served to raise the character of the nation in the 
opinion of Europe in general.' Mr. Rose takes great 
offence at both these remarks ; and says, that the 
constitution itself was violated by the execution of the 
king, while the case of Lord Strafford was but a pri- 
vate injury. We are afraid Mr. Rose does not per- 
fectly understand Mr. Fox, — otherwise it would be 
difficult not to agree with him. The grossness of 
Lord Strafford's case consisted in this, that a bill of 
attainder was brought in, after a regular proceeding 
by impeachment had been tried against him. He was 
substantially acquitted, by the most unexceptionable 
process known in our law, before the bill of attainder 
came to declare him guilty, and to punish him. There 
was here, therefore, a most flagrant violation of all 
law and justice, and a precedent for endless abuses 
and oppressions. In the case of the king, on the 
other hand, there could be no violation of settled rules 
or practice; because the case itself was necessarily 
out of the purview of every rule, and could be drawn 
into no precedent. The constitution, no doubt, w r as 
neceosarily destroyed or suspended by the trial ; but 
Mr Rose appears to forget that it had been destroyed 
or suspended before, by the war, or by the acts of the 
king which brought on the war. If it was lawful to 
fight against the king, it must have been lawful to 
take him prisoner : after he was a prisoner, it was 
both lawful and necessary to consider what should be 
done with him; and every deliberation of this sprt 
had all the assumption, and none of the fairness of a 
trial. Yet Mr. Rose has himself told us, that ' there 
are cases in which resistance becomes a paramount 
duty ;' and probably is not prepared to say, that it 
was more violent and criminal to drive King James 
from the throne in 1688, than to wrest all law and jus- 
tice to take the life of Lord Strafford in 1641. Yet 
the constitution was as much violated by the forfeit- 
ure of the one sovereign, as by the trial and execution 
of the other. It was impossible that the trial of King 
Charles might have terminated in a sentence of mere 
deprivation ; and if James had fought against his peo- 
ple, and been conquered, he might have been tried 
and executed. The constitution was gone for the 
time, in both cases, as soon as force was mutually ap- 
pealed to ; and the violence that followed thereafter, 
to the person of the monarch, can receive no aggrava- 
tion from any view of that nature. 

With regard, again, to the loyal horror which- Mr. 
Rose expresses, when Mr. Fox speaks of the splen- 
dour and magnanimity of the proceedings against the 
king, it is probable that this zealous observer was not 
aware, that his favourite l prerogative writer,' Mr. 
Hume, had used the same, or still loftier expressions, 
in relation to the same event. Some of the words of 
that loyal and unsuspected historian are as follows : — 
* the pomp, the dignity, the ceremony of this transac- 
tion, correspond to the greatest conceptions that are 
suggested in the annals of human kind ; — the dele- 
gates of a great people sitting in judgment upon their 
supreme magistrate, and trying him for his misman- 
agement and breach of trust.'* Cordially as we agree 
* Hume's Historj', vol. vii. p 141. 



with Mr. Fox in the unprofitable severity of this ex- 
ample, it is impossible, we conceive, for any one to 
consider the great, grave, and solemn movement o£ 
the nation that led to it, or the stem and dispassion- 
ate temper in which it was conducted, without feeling 
that proud contrast between this execution and that 
of all other deposed sovereigns in history, — which led 
Mr. Fox, in common with Mr. Hume, and every other 
writer on the subject, to make use of the expressions 
which have been alluded to. 

When Mr. Rose, in the close of his remarks upon 
this subject, permits himself to insinuate, that if Mr. 
Fox thought such high praise due to the publicity, &c. 
of King Charles's trial, he must have felt unbounded 
admiration at that of Lewis XVI., he has laid himself 
open to a charge of such vulgar and uncandid unfair- 
ness, as was not to have been at all expected from a 
person of his rank and description. If Lewis XVI. 
had been openly in arms against his people — if the 
Convention had required no other victim — and had 
settled into a regular government as soon as he was 
removed — there might have been more room for a 
parallel — to which, as the fact actually stands, every 
Briton must listen with indignation. Lewis XVI. was 
wantonly sacrificed to the rage of an insane and blood- 
thirsty faction, and tossed to the executioner among 
the common supplies for the guillotine. The publicity 
and parade of his trial were assumed from no love of 
justice, or sense of dignity; but from a low principle 
of profligate and clamorous defiance to every thing 
that had become displeasing : and ridiculous and in- 
credible as it would appear of any other nation, we 
have not the least doubt that a certain childish emu- 
lation of the avenging liberty of the English had its 
share in producing this paltry copy of our grand and 
original daring. The insane coxcombs who blew out 
their brains, after a piece of tawdry declamation, in 
some of the provincial assemblies^ were about as like 
Cato or Hannibal, as the trial and execution of Lewis 
was like the condemnation of King Charles. Our re- 
gicides were serious and original at least, in the bold, 
bad deeds which they committed. The regicides of 
France were poor theatrical imitators — intoxicated 
with blood and with power, and incapable even of 
forming a sober estimate of the guilt or the conse- 
quences of their actions. Before leaving this subject 
we must remind our readers that Mr. Fox unequivo- 
cally condemns the execution of the king ; and spends 
some time in showing that it was excusable neither 
on the ground of present expediency nor future warn- 
ing. After he had finished that statement, he pro- 
ceeds to say. that notwithstanding what the more 
reasonable part of mankind may think, it is to be 
doubted, whether the proceeding has not served to 
raise the national character in the eyes of foreigners, 
&c. ; and then goes on to refer to the conversations he 
had himself witnessed on that subject abroad. A man 
must be a very zealous royalist, indeed, to disbelieve 
or be offended with this. 

Mr. Rose's next observation is in favour of General 
Monk ; upon whom he is of opinion that Mr. Fox has 
been by far too severe — at the same time that he fails 
utterly in obviating any of the grounds upon which 
that severity is justified. Monk was not responsible 
alone indeed, for restoring the king, without taking 
any security for the people ; but, as wielding the 
whole power of the army, by which that restoration 
was effected, he is certainly chiefly responsible for 
that most criminal omission. As to his indifference 
to the fate of his companions in arms, Mr. Rose does, 
indeed, quote the testimony of his chaplain, who wrote 
a complimentary life of his patron, to prove that, on 
the trial of the regicides, be behaved with great mo- 
deration. We certainly do not rate this testimony 
very highly ; and do think it far more than compen- 
sated by that of Mrs. Hutchinson, who, in the life of 
her husband, says, that on the first proceedings against 
the regicides in the House of Commons, ' Monk sate 
still, and had not one word to interpose for any man, 
but was as forward to set vengeance on foot as any one.'"' 
And a little afterwards she adds, apparently from hei 
own personal knowledge and observation, that l be- 
* Life of Colonel Hutchinson, p. 372. 



RIGHT HON. CHARLES JAMES FOX. 



205 



fore the prisouers were brought to the Tower, Monk 
and his wife came one evening to the garden, and 
caused them to be brought down, only to stare at 
them — which was such a behaviour for that man, who 
had betrayed so many of those that had honoured and 
trusted him, &c, as no story can parallel the inhu- 
manity of. ; * 

With regard again to Mr. Fox's charge of Monk's 
tamely acquiescing in the insults so meanly put on 
the illustrious corpse of his old commander Blake, it is 
perfectly evident, even from the authorities referred 
to by Mr. Rose, that Blake's body was dug up by the 
king's order, among others, and removed out of the 
hallowed precincts of Westminster, to be reinlerred 
with twenty more, in one pit at St. Margaret's. 

But the chief charge is, that on the trial of Argyle, 
Monk spontaneously sent down some confidential let- 
ters, which turned the scale of evidence against that 
unfortunate nobleman. This statement, to which Mr. 
Fox is most absurdly blamed forgiving credit, is made 
on the authority of the three historians who lived 
nearest to the date of the transaction, and who all re- 
port it as quite certain and notorious. These histo- 
rians are Burnet, Baillie, and Cunningham ; nor are 
they contradicted by one writer on the subject, ex- 
cept Dr. Campbell, who, at a period comparatively 
recent, and without pretending to have discovered any 
new document on the subject, is pleased to disbelieve 
them upon certain hypothetical and argumentative 
reasons of his own. These reasons Mr. Laing has 
examined and most satisfactorily obviated in his his- 
tory ; and Mr. Rose has exerted incredible industry 
to defend. The Scottish records for that period have 
perished ; and for this reason, and because a collec- 
tion of pamphlets and newspapers of that age, in Mr. 
Rome's possession, make no mention of the circum- 
stance, he thinks fit to discredit it altogether. If this 
kind of scepticism were to be indulged, there would 
be an end of all reliance on history. In this particu- 
lar case, both Bumet and Baillie speak quite positive- 
ly, from the information of cotemporaries ; and state 
a circumstance that would very well account for the 
silence of the formal accounts of the trial, if any such 
had heen preserved, viz., that Monk's letters were 
not produced till after the evidence was finished on 
both sides, and the debate begun on the result ; — an 
irregularity, by the way, by much too gross to have 
been charged against a public proceeding without any 
foundation. 

Mr. Rose's next observation is directed rather 
against Judge Blackstone than against Mr. Fox ; and 
is meant to show, that this learned person was guilty 
of great innaccuracy in representing the year 1679 as 
the era of good laws and bad government. It is quite 
impossible to follow him through the dull details and 
leeble disputations by which he labours to make it 
appear that our laws were not very good in 1679, and 
that they, as well as the administration of them, were 
much mended after the Revolution. Mr. Fox's, or 
rather Blackstone's remark is too obviously and strik- 
ingly true in substance, to admit of any argument or 
illustration.f 

The next charge against Mr. Fox is for saying, that 

* Life of Colonel Hutchinson, p. 378. 

f Mr. Rose talks a great deal, and very justly, about the 
advantages of the judges not being removable at pleasure ; 
and, with a great air of erudition, informs us, that after 6th 
Charles, all the commissioners were made quamdiu nobis pla- 
cuerit. Mr. Rose's researches, we fear, do not often go beyond 
the records in his custody. If he had looked into Rushworth's 
Collection, he would have found, that, in 1641, King Charles 
agreed to make the commission, quamdiu se bene gesserint ; 
and that some of those illegally removed in the following 
reign, though not officiating in court, still retained certain 
functions in consequence of that appointment. The follow- 
ing is the passage, at p. 1265, vol. iii. of Rushworth : ' After 
the passing of these votes (16th December, 1640) against the 
judges, and transmitting them to the House of Peers, and their 
concurring with the House of Commons therein, an address 
was made to the king shortly after, that his majesty, for the 
future, would not make any judge by patent during pleasure ; 
but that they may hold their places hereafter, quandiu se bene 
gesserint ; and his majesty did really grant the same. And in 
bis speech to both houses of Parliament, at the time of giving 



if Charles II.'s ministers betrayed him, he betrayed 
them in return ; keeping, from some of them at least, 
the secret of what he was pleased to call his religion, 
and the state of his connections with France. After 
the furious attack which Mr. Rose has made in ano- 
ther place upon this prince and his French connec- 
tions, it is rather surprising to see with what zeal he 
undertakes his defence against this very venial sort of 
treachery, of concealing his shame from some of his 
more respectable ministers. The attempt, however, 
is at least as unsuccessful as it is unaccountable. Mr. 
Fox says only, that some of the ministers were not 
trusted with the secret ; and both Dalrymplc and 
Macpherson say, that none but the Catholic counsel- 
lors were admitted to this confidence. Mr. Rose mut- 
ters, that there is no evidence of this ; and himself 
produces an abstract of the secret treaty between 
Lewis and Charles, of May, 1670, to which the sub- 
scriptions of four Catholic ministers of the latter are 
affixed ! 

Mr. Fox is next taxed with great negligence for say- 
ing, that he does not know what proof there is of 
Clarendon's being privy to Charles receiving money 
from France ; and very long quotations are inserted 
from the correspondence printed by Dalrymple and 
Macpherson, — which do not prove Clarendon's know- 
ledge of any money being received, though they do 
seem to establish, that he must have known of its be- 
ing stipulated for. 

After this comes Mr. Rose's grand attack ; in which 
he charges the historian with his whole heavy artil- 
lery of argument and quotation, and makes a vigorous 
effort to drive him from the position, that the early 
and primary object of James's reign was not to esta- 
blish popery in this country, but in the first place to 
render himself absolute : and that, for a considerable 
time, he does not appear to have aimed at any thing 
more than a complete toleration for his own religion. 
The grounds upon which this opinion is maintained 
by Mr. Fox are certainly very probable. There is, in 
the first place, his zeal for the Church of England du- 
ring his brother's life, and the violent oppressions by 
which he enforced a Protestant test in Scotland ; se- 
condly, the fact of his carrying on the government and 
the persecution of nonconformists by Protestant min- 
isters ; and, thirdly, his addresses to his Parliament, 
and the tenour of much of his correspondence with 
Lewis. In opposition to this, Mr. Rose quotes an in- 
finite variety of passages from Barillon's correspon- 
dence, to show in general the unfeigned zeal of this 
unfortunate prince for his religion, and his constant 
desire to glorify and advance it. Now, it is perfectly 
obvious, in the first place, that Mr. Fox never intend- 
ed to dispute James's zeal for popery ; and, in the se- 
cond place, it is very remarkable, that in the first 
seven passages quoted by Mr. Rose, nothing more is 
said to be in the king's contemplation than the com- 
plete toleration of that religion, f The free exercise 
of the Catholic religion in their own houses,' — the 
abolition of the penal laws against Catholics, — l the 
free exercise of that religion,' &c. &c. are the only 
objects to which the zeal of the king is said to be di- 
rected ; and it is not till after the suppression of Mon 
mouth's rebellion, that these phrases are exchanged 
for < a resolution to establish the Catholic religion.' or 

his royal assent to two bills, one to take away the High Com- 
mission Court, and the other the Court of Star-Chamber, and 
regulating the power of the council table, he hath this passage : 
"If you consider what I have done this Parliament, discon- 
tents will not sit in your hearts ; for I hope you remember 
that I have granted that the judges shall hereafter hold their 
places quamdiu se bene gesserint." And likewise, his gracious 
majesty King Charles the Second observed the same rule and 
method in granting patents to judges, quamdiu se bene gesse- 
rint ; as appears upon record in the rolls : viz., to Sergeant 
Slide to be Lord Chief Justice of the King's Bench, Sir Orlan- 
do Bridgeman to be Lord Chief Baron, and afterwards to be 
Lord Chief Justice of Common Pleas; to Sir Robert Foster, 
and others. Mr. Sergeant Archer, now living, notwithstanding 
his removal, still enjoys his patent, being quamdiu se bene ges- 
serint ; and receives a share in the profits of the court, as to 
fees and other proceedings, by virtue of his said patent : and 
his name is used in those fines, &c, aa a judge of that court.' 



906 



WORKS OF THE REV. SIDNEY SMITH. 



' to get that religion established ; ; though it would be 
fair, perhaps, to interpret some even of these phrases 
with reference to those which precede them in the 
correspondence ; especially as, in a letter from Lewis 
to Barillon, so late as 20th August, 1685, he merely 
urges the great expediency of James establishing ' the 
free exercise' of that religion. 

After all, in reality, there is not much substantial 
difference as to this point between the historian and 
his observer. Mr. Fox admits most explicitly, that 
James was zealous in the cause of popery ; and that 
after Monmouth's execution, he made attempts equal- 
ly violent and undisguised to restore it. Mr. Rose, 
on the other hand, admits that he was exceedingly 
desirous to render himself absolute ; and that one 
ground of his attachment to popery probably was, its 
natural affinity with an arbitrary government. Upon 
which of these two objects he set the chief value, and 
which of them he wished to make subservient to the 
other, it is not perhaps now very easy to determine. 
In addition to the authorities referred to by Mr. Fox, 
however, there are many more which tend directly to 
show that one great ground of his antipathy to the 
reformed religion was, his conviction that it led to 
rebellion and republicanism. There are very many 
passages in Barillon to this effect ; and, indeed, the 
burden of all Lewis's letters is to convince James that 
f the existence of monarchy' in England depended on 
the protection of the Catholics. Barillon says (Fox 
App. p. 125), that 'the king often declares publicly, 
that all Calvinists are naturally enemies to royalty, 
and above all, to royalty in England.' And Burnet 
observes (vol. I. p. 73), that the king told him, l that 
among other prejudices he had against the Protestant 
religion, this was one, that his brother and himself 
being in many companies in Paris incognito (during 
the Commonwealth) , where there were Protestants, he 
found they were all alienated from them, and great ad- 
mirers of Cromwell ; so he believed they were all rebels 
in their hearts.'' It will not be forgotten either, that 
in his first address to the council, on his accession, he 
made use of those memorable words : — • I know the 
principles of the Church of England are for monarchy, 
and therefore I shall always take care to defend and 
support it.' While he retained this opinion of its loy- 
alty, accordingly, he did defend and support it ; and 
did persecute all dissidents from its doctrine, at least 
as violently as he afterward did those who opposed 
popery. It was only when he found that the orthodox 
doctrines of non-resistance and jus divinum would not 
go all lengths, and that even the bishops would not 
send his proclamation to their clergy, that he came to 
class them with the rest of the heretics, and to rely 
entirely upon the slavish votaries of the Roman super- 
stition. 

The next set of remarks is introduced for the pur- 
pose of showing that Mr. Fox has gone rather too far, 
in stating that the object both of Charles and James 
in taking money from Lewis, was to render themselves 
independent of Parliament, and to enable them to gov- 
ern without those assemblies. Mr. Rose admits that 
this was the point which both monarch were desirous 
of attaining ; and merely says, that it does not appear 
that either of them expected that the calling of Par- 
liaments could be entirely dispensed with. There 
certainly is not here any worthy subject of conten- 
tion. 

The next point is, as to the sums of money which 
Barillon says he distributed to the whig leaders, as 
well as to the king's ministers. Mr. Rose is very lib- 
eral and rational on this subject ; and thinks it not un- 
fair to doubt the accuracy of the accounts which this 
minister renders of his disbursements. He even quotes 
two passages from Mad. de Sevigne, to show that it 
was the general opinion that he had enriched himself 
greatly by his mission to England. In a letter written 
during the continuance of that mission, she says, < Ba- 
rillon s'en va, &c. ; son emploi est admirable cette an- 
n'ee ; il mangera cinquante mille francs ; mais il sait bien 
ou les prendre? And after his final return, she says he 
is old and rich, and looks without envy on the brilliant 
situation of M. D'Avaus. The only inference he draws 
from the discussion is, that it should have a little sha- 



ken Mr. Fox's confidence in his accuracy. The an 
swer to which obviously is, that his mere dishonesty, 
where his private interest was concerned, can afford 
no reason for doubting his accuracy, where it was not • 
affected. 

In the concluding section of his remarks, Mr. Rose 
resumes his eulogium on Sir Patrick Hume, — introdu- 
ces a splendid encomium on the Marquis of Montrose, 
— brings authority to show, that torture was used to 
extort confession in Scotland even after the Revolu- 
tion, — and then breaks out into a high tory rant 
against Mr. Fox, for supposing that the councillors 
who condemned Argyle might not be very easy in 
their consciences, and for calling those who were hunt, 
ing down that nobleman's dispersed followers < autho- 
rized assassins.' James, he says, was their lawful 
sovereign ■ and the parties in question having been in 
open rebellion, it was the evident duty of all who had 
not joined with them to suppress them. We are not 
very fond of arguing general points of this nature ; ana 
the question here is fortunately special and simple. If 
the tyranny and oppression of James in Scotland — the 
unheard-of enormity of which Mr. Rose owns that 
Mr. Fox has understated — had already given that 
country a far juster title to renounce him than Eng- 
land had in 1688, then James was not l their lawful 
sovereign ' in any sense in which that phrase can be 
understood by a free people ; and those whose cow- 
ardice or despair made them submit to be the instru- 
ments of the tyrant's vengeance on one who had armed 
for their deliverance, may very innocently be pre- 
sumed to have suffered some remorse for their com- 
pliance. With regard, again, to the phrase of ' autho- 
rized assassins,' it is plain from the context of Mr 
Fox, that -it is not applied to the regular forces acting 
against the remains of Argyle's armed followers, but 
to those individuals, whether military or not, who pur- 
sued the disarmed and solitary fugitives, for the pur- 
pose of butchering them in cold blood, in their caverns 
and mountains. 

Such is the substance of Mr. Rose's observations ; 
which certainly do not appear to us of any considera- 
ble value — though they indicate, throughout, a lauda- 
ble industry, and a stDl more laudable consciousness 
of inferiority, — together with (what we are determ- 
ined to believe) a natural disposition to liberality and 
moderation, counteracted by the littleness of party 
jealousy and resentment. We had noted a great num- 
ber of petty misrepresentations and small inaccura-* 
cies; but in a work which is not likely either to be 
much read, or long remembered, these things are not 
worth the trouble of correction. 

Though the book itself is very dull, however, we 
must say that the Appendix is very entertaining. Sir 
Patrick's narrative is clear and spirited ; but what de- 
lights us far more, is another and more domestic and 
miscellaneous narrative of the adventures of his fami- 
ly, from the period of Argyle's discomfiture till their 
return in the train of King William. This is from the 
hand of Lady Murray, Sir Patrick's grand-daughter ; 
and is mostly furnished from the information of her 
mother, his favourite and exemplary daughter. There 
is an air of cheerful magnanimity and artless goodness 
about this little history, which is extremely engaging : 
and a variety of traits of Scottish simplicity and home- 
liness of character, Avhich recommend it, in a peculiar 
manner, to our national feelings. Although we have 
already enlarged this article beyond its proper limits, 
we must give our readers a few specimens of this sin- 
gular chronicle. 

After Sir Patrick's escape, he made his way to his 
own custle, and was concealed for some time in a vault 
under the church, where his daughter, then a girl un- 
der twenty, went alone, every night, with an heroic 
fortitude, to comfort and feed him. The gaiety, how- 
ever, which lightened this perilous intercourse, is to 
us still more admirable than its heroism. 

'She went every night by herself, at midnight, to carry him 
victuals and drink ; and stayed with him as long as she could 
to get home before day. In all this time, my grandfather 
showed me the same constant composure and cheerfulness or 
mind that he continued to possess to his death, which was at 
the age of eighty-four ; all which good qualities she inherited 



DISTURBANCES AT MADRAS. 



207 



from him in a high degree. Often did they laugh heartily in 
that doleful habitation, at different accidents that happened. 
She at that time had a terror for a churchyard, especially in 
the dark, as is not uncommon at her age, by idle nursery sto- 
ries ; but when engaged by concern for her, father, she stum- 
bled over the graves every night alone, without fear of any 
kind entering her thoughts, but for soldiers and parties in 
search of him, which the least noise or motion of a leaf put her 
in terror for. The minister's house was near the church. 
The first night she went, his dogs kept such a barking as put 
her in the utmost fear of a* discovery. My grandmother sent 
for the minister next day, and, upon pretence of a in ad dog, 
got him to hang all his dogs. There was also difficulty of get- 
ting victuals to carry him, without the servants suspecting : 
the only way it was done, was by stealing it off her plate at 
dinner into her lap. Many a diverting story she has told 
about this, and other things of the like nature. Her father 
liked sheep's head ; and, while the children were eating their 
broth, she had conveyed most of one into her lap. When her 
brother Sandy (the late Lord Marchmont) had done, he looked 
up with astonishment, and said, " Mother, will you look at 
Grizzel ; while we have been eating our broth, she has eat up 
the whole sheep's head." This occasioned so much mirth 
among them, that her father, at night, was greatly entertained 
by it ; and desired Sandy might have a share in the next. ' — 
App. p. [v.} 

They then tried to secret him in a low room in his 
own house ; and, for this purpose, to contrive a bed 
concealed under the floor, which this affectionate and 
light-hearted girl secretly excavated herself, by- 
scratching up the earth wiih her nails, l till she left 
not a nail on her fingers,' and carrying it into the gar- 
den at night in bags. At last, however, they all got 
over to Holland, where they seem to have lived in 
great poverty, — but in the same style of magnanimous 
gaiety and cordial affection, of which some instances 
hade been recited. This admirable young woman, 
who lived afterwards with the same simplicity of 
character in the first society in England, seems to have 
exerted ncrself in a way that nothing but affection 
could have rendered tolerable, even to one bred up to 
drudgery. 

' All the time they were there,' (says his daughter,) ' there 
was not a week my mother did not sit up two nights, to do the 
business that was necessary. She went to the market ; went 
to the mill to have their corn ground — which, it seems, is the 
way with good managers there ; dressed the linen ; cleaned 
the house ; made ready dinner ; mended the children's stock- 
ings, and other clothes ; made what she could for them ; and, 
in short, did every thing. Her sister Christian, who was a 
year or two younger, diverted her father and mother, and the 
rest, who were fond of music. Out of their small income, they 
bought a harpsichord for little money (but is a Rucar*), now 
in my custody, and most valuable. My aunt played and sung 
well, and had a great deal of life and humour, but no turn to 
business. Though my mother had the same qualifications, 
and liked it as well as she did, she was forced to drudge ; and 
many jokes used to pass betwixt the sisters about their differ- 
ent occupations.' p. [ix.] 

' Her brother soon afterwards entered into the Prince of 
Orange's guards : and her constant attention was to have him 
appear right in his linen and dress. They wore Tittle point 
cravats and cuffs, which many a night she sat up to have in as 
good order for him as any in the place ; and one of their great- 
est expenses was in dressing him as he ought to be. As their 
house was always full of the unfortunate banished people like 
themselves, they seldom went to dinner without three, or four, 
or five of them to share with them; and many a hundred times 
have I heard her say she could never look back upon their 
manner of living there, without thinking it a miracle. They 
had no want, but plenty of everything they desired, and much 
contentment ; and always declared it the most pleasing part of 
her life, though they were not without their little distresses ; 
but to tliem they were rather jokes than grievances. The pro- 
fessors and men of learning in the place came often to see my 
grandfather. The best entertainment he could give them was 
a glass of alabast beer, which was a better kind of ale than 
common. He sent his son Andrew, the late Lord Kimmer- 
ghame, a boy, to draw some for them in the cellar : he brought 
i' up with great diligence ; but in the other hand the spiket of 
the barrel. My grandfather said, " Andrew, what is that in 
your hand J" When he saw it, he run down with speed ; but 
the beer waa all run out before he got there. This occasioned 
much mirth ; though, perhaps, they did not well know where 
to get more.'— pp. [x. xi.] 

Sir Patrick, we are glad to hear, retained this kindly 
cheerfulness of character to the last ; and, after he 

* An eminent maker of that time. 



was an earl and chancellor of Scotland, and unable to 
stir with gout, had himself carried to the room where 
his children and grandchildren were dancing, and in • 
sisted on beating time with his foot. Nay, when dy- 
ing at the advanced age of eighty-four, he could not 
resist his old propensity to joking, but uttered various 
pleasantries on the disappointment the worms would 
meet with, when, after boring through his thick coffin, 
they would find little but bones. 

There is, in the Appendix, besides these narrations, 
a fierce attack upon Burnet, which is full of inaccura- 
cies and ill temper ; and some interesting particulars 
of Monmouth's imprisonment and execution. We dare 
say Mr. Rose could publish a volume or two of very 
interesting tracts ; and can venture to predict, that his 
collections will be much more popular than his obser- 
vations. 



DISTURBANCES AT MADRAS. (Edinburgh 
Review, ldlO.) * 

Narrative of the Origin and Progress of the Dissensions at 

the Presidency of Madras, founded on Original Papers and 

Correspondence. Lloyd, London, 1810. 
Account of the Origin and Progress of the late Discontents of 

the Army on the Madras Establishment. Cadell and Davies, 

London, 1810. 
Statement of Facts delivered to the Right Honourable Lord 

Minto. By William Petrie, Esq. Stockdale, London, 1810 

The disturbances which have lately taken place in 
our East Indian possessions, would, at any period, have 
excited a considerable degree of alarm ; and those feel- 
ings are, of course, not a little increased by the ruin- 
ous aspect of our European affairs. The revolt of an 
army of eighty thousand men is an event which seems 
to threaten so nearly the ruin of the country in which 
it happens, that no common curiosity is excited as to 
the causes which could have led to it, and the means 
by which its danger was averted. On these points, 
we shall endeavour to exhibit to our readers the infor- 
mation afforded to us by the pamphlets whose titles 
we have cited. The first of these is understood to be 
written by an agent of Sir George Barlow, sent over 
for the express purpose of defending his measures ; 
the second is most probably the production of some one 
of the dismissed officers, or, at least, founded upon 
their representations ; the third statement is by Mr. 
Petrie, — and we most cordially recommend it to the 
perusal of our readers. It is characterized, through- 
out, by moderation, good sense, and a feeling of duty. 
We have seldom read a narrative, which, on the first 
face of it, looked so much like truth. It has, of 
course, produced the ruin and dismissal of this gentle- 
man, though we have not the shadow of doubt, that if 
his advice had been followed, every unpleasant occur- 
rence which has happened in India might have been 
effectually prevented. 

In the year 1802,a certain monthly allowance, pro- 
portioned to their respective ranks, was given to each 
officer of the coast army, to enable him to provide 
himself with a camp equipage ; and a monthly allow- 
ance was also made to the commanding officers of the 
native corps, for the provision of the camp equipage of 
these corps. This arrangement was commonly called 
the tent contract. Its intention (as the pamphlet of 
Sir George Barlow's agent very properly states) was 
to combine facility of movement in military operations 
with views of economy. In the general revision of its 
establishments, set on foot for the purposes of econo- 
my by the Madras government, this contract was con- 
sidered as entailing upon them a very unnecessary ex- 
pense; and the then commander-in-chief, General 
Craddock, directed Colonel Munro, the quartermaster- 
general, to make a report to him upon the subject. 
The report, which was published almost as soon as it 
was made up, recommends the abolition of this con- 
tract ; and, among other passages for the support of 
this opinion, has the following one : — 

I Six years' experience of the practical effects of the existing 
system of the camp equipage equipment of the native army, 
has afforded means of forming a judgment relative to its ad 
vantages and efficiency which were not possessed by the per 



WORKS OF THE REV. SIDNEY SMITH. 



sons who proposed its introduction ; and an attentive examina- 
tion of its operations during that period of time has suggested 
the following observations regarding it : 

After stating that the contract is needlessly expen- 
sive — that it subjects the Company to the same char- 
ges for troops in the garrison as for those in the field — 
the report proceeds to state the following observation, 
made on the authority of six years experience and atten- 
tive examination . 

•Thirdly. By granting the same allowances in peace and 
war for the equipment of native corps, while the expenses inci- 
dental to that charge are unavoidably much greater in war than 
in peace, it places the interest and duty of officers commanding 
native corps in direct opposition to one another. It makes 
it their interest that their corps should not be in a state of 
efficiency tit for field service, and therefore furnishes strong 
inducements to neglect their most important duties.' — Accurate 
and Authentic Narrative, pp. 117, 118. 

Here, then, is not only a proposal for reducing the 
emoluments of the principal officers of the Madras 
army, but a charge of the most flagrant nature. The 
first they might possibly have had some right to con- 
sider as a hardship ; but, when severe and unjust in- 
vective was superadded to strict retrenchment — when 
their pay and their reputation were diminished at the 
same time — it cannot be considered as surprising, that 
such treatment, on the part of the government, should 
lay the foundation for a spirit of discontent in those 
troops who had recently made such splendid additions 
to the Indian empire, and established, in the progress 
of these acquisitions, so high a character for discipline 
and courage. It must be remembered, that an officer 
on European and one on Indian service are in very dif- 
ferent situations, and propose to themselves very dif- 
ferent objects. The one never thinks of making a 
fortune by his profes»ion, while the hope of ultimately 
gaining an independence is the principal motive for 
which the Indian officer banishes himself from his 
country. To diminish the emoluments of his profes- 
sion is to retard the period of his return, and to frus- 
trate the purpose for which he exposes his life and 
health in a burning climate, on the other side of the 
world. We make these observations, certainly, with- 
out any idea of denying the right of the East India 
Company to make any retrenchments they may think 
proper, but to show that it is a right which ought to 
be exercised with great delicacy and with sound dis- 
cretion — that it should only be exercised when the re- 
trenchment is of real importance, and, above all, that 
it should always be accompanied by every mark of 
suavitv and conciliation. Sir George Barlow, on the 
contrary, committed the singular imprudence of stig- 
matizing the honour, and wounding the feelings of the 
Indian officers. At the same moment that he dimi- 
nishes their emoluments, he tells them, that the India 
Company take away their allowances for tents, be- 
cause those allowances have been abused in the mean- 
est, most profligate, and most unsoldierlike manner ; 
for this, and more than this is conveyed in the report 
of Colonel Munro, published by order of Sir George 
Barlow. If it was right, in the first instance, to dimi- 
nish the emoluments of so vast an army, it was cer- 
tainly indiscreet to give such reasons for it. If any 
individual had abused the advantages of the tent con- 
tract, he might have been brought to a court-martial ; 
and if his guilt had been established, his punishment, 
we will venture to assert, would not have occasioned a 
a moment of complaint or disaffection in the army ; 
but that a civilian, a gentleman accustomed only to 
the details of commerce, should begin his government, 
over a settlement with which he was utterly unac- 
quainted, by telling one of the bravest set of officers in 
the world, that, for six years past, they had been, in 
the basest manner, sacrificing their duty to their in- 
terest, does appear to us an instance of indiscretion, 
which, if frequently repeated, would soon supersede 
the necessity of any further discussion upon Indian 
affairs. 

The whole transaction, indeed, appears to have 
been gone into with a disregard to the common profes- 
sional feelings of an army, which is to us utterly inex- 
plicable. The opinion of the commander-in-chief, 
General Macdowall, was never asked upon the subject ; 



I not a single witness was examined; the whole seems 
to have depended upon the report of Colonel Munro, 
I the youngest staff-officer of the army, published in 
spite of the earnest remonstrance of Colonel Capper, 
|he adjutant-general, and before three days had been 
given him to substitute his own plan, which Sir George 
Barlow had promised to read before the publication of 
Colonel Munro's report. Nay, this great plan of redue 
tion was never even submitted to the military board, 
by whom all subjects of that description were, accord- 
ing to the orders of the court of directors, and the 
usage of the service, to be discussed and digested, pre 
vious to their coming before government. 

Shortly after the promulgation of this very indiscreet 
paper, the eommander-in- chief, General Macdowall, 
received letters from almost all the officers command- 
ing native corps, representing, in terms adapted to the 
feelings of each, the stigma which was considered to 
attach to them individually, and appealing to the au- 
thority of the commander-in-chief for redress against 
such charges, and to his personal experience for their 
falsehood. ^ To these letters the general replied, tha 
the orders in question had been prepared unthout any 
reference to his opinion, and that, as the matter was so 
far advanced, he deemed it inexpedient to interfere. 
The officers commanding corps, finding that no steps 
were taken to remove the obnoxious insinuations, and 
considering that, while they remained, an indelible dis- 
grace was cast upon their characters, prepared charges 
against Colonel Munro. These charges were for- 
warded to General Macdowall, referred by him to the 
judge advocate general, and returned with his ob- 
jections to them, to the officers who had preferred the 
charges. For two months after this period, General 
Macdowall appears to have remained in a state of un- 
certainty, as to whether he would or would not bring 
Colonel Munro to a court-martial upon the charges pre- 
ferred against him by the commanders of the corps. 
At last, urged by the discontents of the army, he de- 
termined in the affirmative ; and Colonel Munro was 
put in arrest, preparatory to his trial. Colonel Munro 
then appealed directly to the governor, Sir George 
Barlow ; and was released by a positive order from 
him. It is necessary to state, that all appeals of of- 
ficers to the government in India always pass through 
the hands of the commander-in-chief; and this appeal, 
therefore, of Colonel Munro, directed to the govern- 
ment, was considered by General Macdowall as a great 
infringement of military discipline. We have very 
great doubts whether Sir George Barlow was not guilty 
of another great mistake in preventing the court-mar- 
tial from taking place. It is undoubtedly true, that no 
servant of the public is amenable to justice for doing 
what the government orders him to do ; but he is not 
entitled to protection under the pretence of that order, 
if he has done something which it evidently did not 
require of him. If Colonel Munro had been ordered 
to report upon the conduct of an individual officer, and 
it could be proved that, in gratification of private ma- 
lice, he had taken that opportunity of stating the most 
infamous and malicious falsehoods — could it be urged 
that his conduct might not be fairly scrutinized in a 
court of justice, or a court-martial? If this were other- 
wise, any duty delegated by government to an indi- 
vidual would become the most intolerable source ot 
oppression : he might gratify every enmity and anti- 
pathy — indulge in every act of malice — vilify and tra- 
duce every one whom he hated — and then shelter him- 
self under the plea of public service . Every body has 
a right to do what the supreme power orders him to i 
do ; but he does not thereby acquire a right to do what 
he has not been ordered to do. Colonel Munro was 
directed to make a report upon the state of the 
army : the officers whom he has traduced accuse him 
of reporting something totally different from the state 
of the army — something which he and every body else 
knew to be different — and this for the malicious pur- 
pose of calumniating their reputation. If this was 
true, Colonel Munro could not plead the authority of 
government ; for the authority of government was af- 
forded to him for a very different purpose. In this 
view of the case, we cannot see how the dignity of 
government was attacked by the proposal of the court* 



DISTURBANCES AT MADRAS. 



martial, or to what other remedy those who had suf- 
fered from his abuse of power could have had recourse. 
Colonel Munro had been promised, by General Mac- 
dowall, that the court-martial should consist of king's 
officers: there could not, therefore, have been any 
rational suspicion that this trial would have been un- 
fair, or his judges unduly influenced. 

Soon after Sir George Barlow had shown this reluc- 
tance to give the complaining officers an opportunity 
of re-establishing their injured character, General Mac- 
dowall sailed for England, and left behind him, for 
publication, an order, in which Colonel Munro was 
reprimanded for a violent breach of military disci- 
pline, in appealing to the governor otherwise than 
through the customary and prescribed channel of the 
commander-in-chief. As this paper is very short, and 
at the same time very necessary to the right compre- 
hension of this case, we shall lay it before our readers. 

' G. O. by the Commander-in-chief. 

' The immediate departure of Lieutenant-General Macdowall 
from Madras will prevent his pursuing the design of bringing 
Lieutenant-Colonel Munro, quartermaster-general, to trial, 
for disrespect to the commander-in-chief, for disobedience of 
orders, and for contempt of military authority, in having re- 
sorted to the power of the civil government, in defiance of the 
judgment of the officer at the head of the army, who had placed 
him under arrest, on charges preferred against him by a num- 
ber of officers commanding native corps, in consequence of 
which appeal direct to the honourable the president in council, 
Lieutenant-General Macdowall has received positive orders 
from the chief secretary to liberate Lieutenant-Colonel Munro 
from arrest. 

'Such conduct on the part of Lieutenant-Colonel Munro, 
being destructive of subordination, subversive of military dis- 
cipline, a violati%n of the sacred rights of the commander-in- 
chief, and holding out a most dangerous example to the ser- 
vice, Lieutenant-General Macdowall, in support of the dignity 
of the profession, and his own station and character, feels it 
incumbent on him to express his strong disapprobation of Lieu- 
tenant-Colonel Munro's unexampled proceedings, and con- 
siders it a duty imposed upon him to reprimand Lieutenant- 
Colonel Munro in general orders; and he is hereby repri- 
manded accordingly. (Signed) T. Boles, d. a. g.' — Acur. 
and Auth. Nar. pp. 68. 69. 

Sir George Barlow, in consequence of this paper, 
immediately deprived General Macdowall of his situa- 
tion of commander-in-chief, which he had not yet 
resigned, though he had quitted the settlement ; and, 
as the official signature of the deputy adjutant-general 
appeared to the paper, that officer also was suspended 
from his situation. Colonel Capper, the adjutant-ge- 
neral, in the most honourable manner informed Sir 
George Barlow that he was the culpable and responsi- 
ble person ; and that the name of his deputy only 
appeared to the paper in consequence of his positive 
order, and because he himself happened to be absent 
on shipboard with General Macdowall. This gene- 
rous conduct on the part of Colonel Capper involved 
himself in punishment, without extricating the inno- 
cent person whom he intended to protect. The Ma- 
dras government, always swift to condemn, doomed 
him to the same punishment as Major Boles ; and he 
was suspended from his office. 

This paper we have read over with great attention ; 
and we really cannot see wherein its criminality con- 
sists, or on what account it could have drawn down on 
General Macdowall so severe a punishment as the 
privation of the high and dignified office which he 
held. The censure upon Colonel Munro was for a 
violation of the regular etiquette of the army, in 
appealing to the governor otherwise than through the 
channel of the commander-in-chief. This was an 
entirely new offence on the part of Colonel Munro. 
Sir George Barlow had given no opinion upon it; it 
had not been discussed between him and the com- 
mander-in-chief; and the commander-in-chief was 
clearly at liberty to act in this point as he pleased. 
He does not reprimand Colonel Munro for obeying Sir 
George Barlow's orders — for Sir George had given no 
orders upon the subject ; but he blames him for trans- 
gressing a well-known and important rule of the ser- 
vice. We have great doubts if he was not quite right 
in giving this reprimand. But at all events, if he was 
wrong — if Colonel Munro was not guilty of the offence 
imputed still the erroneous punishment which the 

O 



general had inflicted merited no such severe retribu- 
tion as that resorted to by Sir George Barlow. There 
are no reflections in the paper on the conduct of the 
governor or the government. The reprimand is 
grounded entirely upon the breach of that military dis- 
cipline which it was undoubtedly the business of Gene- 
ral Macdowall to maintain in the most perfect purity 
and vigour. Nor has the paper any one expression in 
it foreign to this purpose. We were, indeed, not a 
little astonished at reading it. We had imagined that 
a paper which drew after it such a long train of dismis- 
sals and suspensions, must have contained a declara- 
tion of war against the Madias government, — an ex- 
hortation to the troops to throw off their allegiance, — 
or an advice to the natives to drive their intrusive mas- 
ters away, and become as free as their forefathers had 
left them. Instead of this, we find nothing more than 
a common reprimand from a commander-in-chief to a 
subordinate officer, for transgressing the bounds of his 
duty. If Sir George Barlow had governed kingdoms 
six months longer, we cannot help thinking he would 
have been a little more moderate. 

But whatever difference of opinion there may be 
respecting the punishment of General Macdowall, we 
can scarcely think there can be any with regard to the 
conduct observed towards the adjutant-general and his 
deputy. They were the subordinates of the com- 
mander-in-chief, and were peremptorily bound to pub- 
fish any general orders which he might command them 
to pubfish. They would have been liable to very 
severe punishment if they had not ; and it appears to 
us the most flagrant outrage against all justice to con- 
vert their obedience into a fault. It is true, no subor- 
dinate officer is bound to obey any order which is 
plainly, and to any common comprehension, illegal; 
but then the illegality must be quite manifest ; the 
order must imply such a contradiction to common 
sense, and such a violation of duties superior to the 
duty of military obedience, that there can be scarcely 
two opinions on the subject. Wherever any fair doubt 
can be raised, the obedience of the inferior officer is 
to be considered as proper and meritorious. Upon any 
other principle, his situation is the most cruel imagin- 
able : he is liable to the severest punishment, even to 
instant death, if he refuses to obey ; and if he does 
obey, he is exposed to the animadversion of the civil 
power, which teaches him that he ought to have can-, 
vassed the order, — to have remonstrated against it, — 
and, in case this opposition proved ineffectual, to have 
disobeyed it. We have no hesitation in pronouncing 
the imprisonment of Colonel Capper and Major Boles 
to have been an act of great severity and great indis- 
cretion, and such as might very fairly give great 
offence to an army, who saw themselves exposed to 
the same punishments, for the same adherence to their 
duties. 

' The measure of removing Lieutenant-Colonel Capper and 
Major Boles,' says Mr. Petrie, ' was universally condemned by 
the most respectable officers in the army, and not more so by 
the officers in the Company's service, than by those of his 
majesty's regiments. It was felt by all as the introduction of 
a most dangerous principle, and setting a pernicious example 
of disobedience and insubordination to all the gradations of 
military rank and authority ; teaching inferior officers to ques- 
tion the legality of the orders of their superiors, and bringing 
into discussion questions which may endanger the very exist- 
ence of government. Our proceedings at the time operated 
like an electric shock, and gave rise to combinations, associa- 
tions, and discussions, pregnant with danger to every consti 
tuted authority in India. It was observed that the removal 
of General Macdowall (admitting the expediency of the mea- 
sure), sufficiently vindicated the authority of government, and 
exhibited to the army a memorable proof that the supreme 
power is vested in the civil authority. 

' The offence came from the general, and he was punished 
for it ; but to suspend from the service the mere instruments 
of office, for the ordinary transmission of an order to the army, 
was universally condemned as an act of inapplicable severity, 
which might do infinite mischief, but could not accomplish any 
good or beneficial purpose. It was to court unpopularity, and 
adding fuel to the flame, which was ready to burst forth iu 
every division of the army ; that to vindicate the measure on 
the assumed illegality of the order, is to resort to a principle 
of a most dangerous tendency, capable of being extended in 
its application to purposes subversive of the foundations of all 
authority, civil as well as military. If subordinate officers are 



210 



WORKS OP THE REV. SIDNEY SMITH. 



encouraged to judge of the legality of the orders of their su- 
periors, we introduce a precedent of incalculable mischief, 
neither justified by the spirit nor the practice of the laws. Is 
it not better to have the responsibility on the head of the au- 
thority which issues the order, except in cases so plain, that 
the most common capacity can judge of their being direct 
violations of the established and acknowledged laws? Is the 
intemperance of the expressions, the indiscretion of the 
opinions, the inflammatory tendency of the order, so eminently 
dangerous, so evidently calculated to excite to mutiny and 
disobedience, so strongly marked with the features of crimi- 
nality, as not to be mistaken? Was the order, I beg leave to 
ask, of this description, of such a nature as to justify the adju- 
tant-general and his deputy in their refusal to publish it, to 
disobey the order of the commander-in-chief, to revolt from 
hie authority, and to complain of him to the government ? 
Such were the views I took of that unhappy transaction ; and, 
as I foresaw serious mischief from the measure, not only to 
the discipline of the army, but even to the security of the civil 
government, it was my duty to state my opinion to Sir G. Bar- 
low, and to use every argument which my reason suggested, 
to prevent the publication of the order. In this I completely 
failed ; the suspension took effect ; and the match was laid that 
has communicated the flame to almost every military mind in 
India. I recorded no dissent ; for as a formal opposition could 
only tend to exonerate myself from a certain degree of re- 
sponsibility, without effecting any good public purpose, and 
might probably be misconstrued or misconceived by those to 
whom our proceedings were made known, it was a more 
honourable discharge of my duty to relinquish this advantage, 
than to comply with the mere letter of the order respecting 
dissents. I explained this motive of my conduct to Sir G. 
Barlow.'— -Statement of Facts, pp, 20, 23. 

After these proceedings on the part of the Madras 
government, the disaffection of the troops rapidly 
increased ; absurd and violent manifestoes were pub- 
lished by the general officers ; government was insult- 
ed ; and the army soon broke out into open mutiny. 

When the mutiny was fairly begun, the conduct of 
the Madras government in quelling it, seems nearly as 
objectionable as that by which it had been excited. 
The governor, in attempting to be dignified, perpetu- 
ally fell into the most puerile irritability ; and wish- 
ing to be firm, was guilty of injustice and violence. 
Invitations to dinner were made an affair of state. 
Long negotiations appear respecting whole corps of 
officers who refused to dine with Sir George Barlow ; 
and the first persons in the settlement were employed 
to persuade them to eat the repast which his excel- 
lency had prepared for them. A whole school of 
military lads were sent away, for some trifling dis- 
play of partiality to the cause of the army; and every 
unfortunate measure recurred to, which a weak under- 
standing and a captious temper could employ to bring 
a government into contempt. Officers were dismissed ; 
but dismissed without trial, and even without accusa- 
tion. The object seemed to be to punish somebody : 
whether it was the right or the wrong person was 
less material. Sometimes the subordinate was select- 
ed, where the principal was guilty; sometimes the 
superior was sacrificed for the ungovernable conduct 
of those who were under his charge. The blows 
were strong enough ; but they came from a man who 
shut his eyes, and struck at random ; — conscious that 
he must do something to repel the danger — but so 
agitated by its proximity that ne could not look at it, 
or take a proper aim. 

Among the other absurd measures resorted to by 
this new eastern emperor, was the notable expedient 
of imposing a test upon the officers of the army, ex- 
pressive of their loyalty and attachment to the go- 
vernment ; and as this was done at a time when some 
officers were in open rebellion, others fluctuating, and 
many almost resolved to adhere to their duty, it had 
the very natural and probable effect of uniting them 
all in opposition to government. To impose a test, 
or trial of opinions, is at all times an unpopular 
species of inquisition ; and at a period when men were 
hesitating whether they should obey or not, was cer- 
tainly a very dangerous and rash measure. It could 
be no security ; for men who would otherwise rebel 
against their government, certainly would not be re- 
strained by any verbal barriers of this kind ; and, at 
the same time that it promised no effectual security, 
it appeared to increase the danger of irritated com- 
binatiou. This very rash measure immediately pro- 



duced the strongest representations and remonstrances 
from king's officers of the most unquestionable loyalty. 

' Lieutenant Colonel Vesey, commanding at Palamcotah, ap- 
prehends the most fatal consequences to the tranquillity of the 
southern provinces, if Colonel Wilkinson makes any hostile 
movements from Trichinopoly. In different letters he states, 
that such a step must inevitably throw the company's troops 
into open revolt. He has ventured to write in the strongest 
terms to Colonel Wilkinson, entreating him not to march 
against the southern troops, and pointing out the ruinous con- 
sequences which may he expected from such a measure 

'Lieutenant Colonel Stuart in Travancore, and Colonel 
Forbes in Malabar, have written, that they are under no appre- 
hension for the tranquillity of those provinces, or for the fidelity 
of the company's troops, if government does not insist on en- 
forcing the orders for the signature of the test; but that, if 
this is attempted, the security of the country will be immi- 
nently endangered. These orders are to be enforced ; and I 
tremble for the consequences.' — Statement of Facts, pp. 53, 54. 

The following leUer from the Honourable Colonel 
Stuart, commanding a king's regiment, was soon after 
received by Sir George Barlow : — 

1 The late measures of government, as carried in effect at the 
Presidency and Trichinopoly, have created a most violent 
ferment among the corps here. At those places where the 
European force was so far superior in number to the native' 
the measure probably was executed without difficulty; but 
here, where there are seven battalions of sepoys', and a com- 
pany and a half of artillery, to our one regiment, I found it 
totally impossible to carry the business to the same length, 
particularly as any tumult among our own corps would cer 
tainly bring the people of Travancore upon us. 

4 It is in vain, therefore, for me, with the small force I can 
depend upon, to attempt to stem the torrenyiere by any acts 
of violence. 

'Most sincerely and axiously do I wish that the present tu- 
mult may subside, without fatal consequences ; which, if the 
present violent measures are continued, I much fear will not 
be the case. If blood is once spilt in the cause, there is no 
knowing where it may end; and the probable consequence 
will be, that India will be lost for ever. So many officers of 
the army have gone to such lengths, that unless a general am- 
nesty is granted, tranquillity can never be restored. 

' The honourable the governor in council will not, I trust, 
impute to me any other motives, for having thus given my 
opinion. I am actuated solely by anxiety for the public good 
and the benefit of my country ; and I think it my duty, holding 
the responsible station which I now do, to express my senti- 
meuts at so awful a period. 

'Where there are any prospects of success, it might be 
right to persevere ; but where every day's experience proves, 
that the more coercive the measures adopted, the more violent 
are the consequences, a different and more conciliatory line of 
conduct ought to be adopted. I have the honour, &c.' — State- 
ment of Facts, pp. 55, 56. 

'A letter from Colonel Forbes, commanding in Malabar, 
states that, to prevent a revolt in the province, and the prob- 
able march of the company's troops towards Seringapatam, 
he.had accepted of a modification in the test, to be signed by 
the officers on their parole, to make no hostile movements 
until the pleasure of the government was known. — Disap- 
proved by the government, and ordered to enforce the former 
orders.' — Statement of Facts, p. 61. 

It can scarcely be credited, that in spite of these 
repeated remonstrances from officers, whose lo) r alty 
and whose knowledge of the subject could not be sus- 
pected, this test was ordered to be enforced, and the 
severest rebukes inflicted upon those who had pre- 
sumed to doubt of its propriety, or suspend its opera, 
tion. Nor let any man say that the opinionative per- 
son who persevered in this measure saw more clearly 
and deeply into the consequence of his own measures 
than those who were about him ; for unless Mr. Petric 
has been guilty, and repeatedly guilty, of a most 
downright and wilful falsehood, Sir George Barlow 
had not the most distant conception, during all these 
measures, that the army would ever venture upon re- 
volt. 

' Government, or rather the head of the government, was 
never correctly informed of the actual state of the army, or I 
think he would have acted otherwise ; he was told, and he 
was willing to believe, that the discontents were confined to a 
small portion of the troops ; that a great majority disapproved 
of their proceedings, and were firmly and unalterably attached 
to the government.'— Statement of Facts, pp. 23, 24. 

In a conversation which Mr. Petrie had with Sir 
George Barlow upon the subject of the army— and in 



DISTURBANCES AT MADRAS. 



211 



the course of which he recommends to that gentleman 
more lenient measures, and warns him of the increas- 
ing disaffection of the troops — he gives us the follow- 
ing account of Sir George Barlow's notions of the then 
state of the army : — 

'Sir G. Barlow assured me I was greatly misinformed; that 
he could rely upou his intelligence ; and would produce to 
council the most satisfactory and unequivocal proofs of the 
fidelity of nine-tenths of the army ; that the discontents were 
confined almost exclusively to the southern divison of tiie 
army ; that the troops composing the subsidiary force, those 
in the ceded districts, in the centre, and a part of the northern 
division, were all untainted by those principles which had 
misled the rest of the army.'— Statement of Facts, pp. 27, 28. 

All those violent measures, then, the spirit and 
wisdom of which have been so much extolled, were 
not measures of the consequences of which their 
author had the most distant suspicion. They were 
not the acts of a man who knew that he must unavoid- 
ably, in the discharge of his duty, irritate, but that 
he could ultimately evercome that irritation. They 
appear, on the contrary, to have proceeded from a 
most gross and scandalous ignorance of the opinions 
of the army. He expected passive submission, and 
met with universal revolt. So far, then, his want of 
intelligence and sagacity are unquestionably proved. 
He did not proceed with useful measures, and run the 
risk of a revolt, for which he was fully prepared ; but 
he carried these measures into execution, firmly con- 
vinced that they would occasion no revolt at all.* 

The fatal nature of this mistake is best exemplified 
by the means recurred to for its correction. The grand 
expedient relied upon was to instigate the natives, 
men and officers, to disobey their European com- 
manders;. an expedient by which present safety was 
secured at the expense of every principle upon which 
the permanence of our Indian empire rests. There 
never was in the world a more singular spectacle than 
to see a few thousand Europeans governing so despo- 
tically fifty or sixty millions of people, of different 
climate, religion, and habits — forming them into large 
and well-disciplined armies — and leading them out to 
the further subjugation of the native powers of India. 
But can any words be strong enough to paint the rash- 
ness of provoking a mutiny, which could only be got 
under by teaching these armies to act against their 
European commanders, and to use their actual strength 
in overpowering their officers ? — or, is any man en- 
titled to the praise of firmness and sagacity, who gets 
rid of a present danger by encouraging a principle 
which renders that danger more frequent and more 
violent. We will venture to assert, that a more un- 
wise or a more unstatesmanlike action was never com- 
mitted by any man in any country ; and we are griev- 
ously mistaken, if any length of time elapse before 
the evil consequences of it are felt and deplored by 
every man who deems the welfare of our Indian 
colonies of any importance to the prosperity of the 
mother country We cannot help contrasting the 
management of t a discontents of the Madras army, 
with the manner in which the same difficulty was got 
over with the army at Bengal. A little increase of 
attention and emolument to the head of that army, 
under the management of a man of rank and talents, 
dissipated appearances which the sceptred pomp of a 
merchant's clerk would have blown up into a rebellion 
in three weeks ; and yet the Bengal army is at this 
moment in as good a state of discipline, as the Eng- 
lish fleet to which Lord Howe made such abject con- 
cessions — and in a state to be much more permanently 
depended upon than the army which has been so 
effectually ruined by the inconveniently great soul of 
the present governor of Madras. 

Sir George Barlow's agent, though faithful to his 
employment of calumniating those who were in any 
degree opposed to his principal, seldom loses sight of 
sound discretion, and confines his invectives to whole 
bodies of men, except where the dead are concerned. 

" We should have been alarmed to have seen Sir George 
Barlow, junior, churchwarden of St. George's, Hanover Square, 
—an offic.e so nobly filled by Giblet and Leslie ; it was an huge 
afHiction to see so incapable a man at the head of the Indian 
empire. 



! Against Colonel Capper, General Macdowall, and Mr. 
Roebuck, who are now no longer alive to answer for 
themselves, he is intrepidly severe ; in all these in- 
stances he gives a full loose to his sense of duty, and 
inflicts upon them the severest chastisement. In his 
attack upon the civilians, he is particularly careful to 
keep to generals ; and so rigidly does he adhere to 
this principle, that he does not support his assertion, 
that the civil service was disaffected as well as the 
military, by one single name, one single fact, or by 
any other means whatever, than his own affirmation 
of the fact. The truth (as might be supposed to be 
the case from such sort of evidence) is diametricaily 
opposite. Nothing could be more exemplary, during 
the whole of the rebellion, than the conduct of the 
civil servants ; and though the courts of justice were 
interfered with — though the most respectable servants 
of the company were punished for the verdicts they 
had given as jurymen — though many were dismissed 
for the slightest opposition to the pleasure of go- 
vernment, even in the discharge of official duties, 
where remonstrance was absolutely necessary, — 
though the greatest provocation was given, and the 
greatest opportunity afforded to the civil servants for 
revolt, there is not a single instance in which the 
shadow of disaffection has been proved against any 
civil servant. This we say. from an accurate exami- 
nation of all the papers which nave been published on 
the subject ; and we do not hesitate to affirm, that 
there never was a more unjust, unfounded, and profli- 
gate charge made against any body of men ; nor have 
we often witnessed a more complete scene of folly and 
violence, than the conduct of the Madras government 
to its civil servants, exhibited during the whole period 
of the mutiny. 

Upon the whole, it appears to us, *hat the Indian 
army was ultimately driven into revolt by the indis- 
cretion and violence of the Madras government ; and 
that every evil which has happened might, with the 
greatest possible facility, have been avoided. 

We have no sort of doubt that the governor always 
meant well ; but we are equally certain that he almost 
always acted ill ; and where incapacity rises to a cer- 
tain height, for all practical purposes, the motive is 
of very little consequence. That the late General 
Macdowall was a weak man, is unquestionable. He 
was also irritated (and not without reason) , because 
he was deprived of a seat in council, which the com- 
manders before him had commonly enjoyed. A little 
attention, however, on the part ot the government — 
the compliment of consulting him upon subjects con- 
nected with his profession — any of those little arts 
which are taught, not by a consummate political skill, 
but dictated by common good nature, and by the habit 
of mingling with the world, would have produced the 
effects of conciliation, and employed the force of Ge- 
neral Macdo wall's authority in bringing the army into 
a better temper of mind. Instead of this, it appears 
to have been almost the object, and if not the object, 
certainly the practice, of the Madras government to 
neglect and insult this officer. Changes of the greatest 
importance were made without his advice, and even 
without any communication with him ; and it was too 
visible to those whom he was to command, that he 
himself possessed no sort of credit with his superiors. 
As to the tour which General Macdowall is supposed 
to have made for the purpose of spreading disaffection 
among the troops, and the part which he is represent- 
ed by the agents to have taken in the quarrels of the 
civilians with the government, we utterly discredit 
these imputations. They are unsupported by any kind 
of evidence ; and we believe them to be mere inven- 
tions, circulated by the friends of the Madras govern- 
ment. General Macdowall appears to us to have been 
a weak, pompous man ; extremely out of humour ; 
offended with the slights he had experienced; and 
whom any man of common address might have ma- 
naged with the greatest ease : but we do not see, in 
any part of his conduct, the shadow of disloyalty and 
disaffection ; and we are persuaded, that the assertion 
would never have been made, if he himself had been 
alive to prove its injustice. 
Besides the contemptuous treatment of General 



212 



WORKS OF THE REV. SIDNEY SMITH. 



Macdowall, we have great doubts whether the Mad- I 
ras government ought not to have suffered Colonel 
onro to be put upon his trial; and to punish the I 
ificers who solicited that trial for the purgation of 
their own characters, appears to us (whatever the in- 
tention was) to have been an act of mere tyranny. We 
think, too, that General Macdowall was very hastily 
and unadvisedly removed from his situation ; and upon 
the unjust treatment of Colonel Capper and Major 
Boles there can scarcely be two opinions. In the pro- 
gress of the mutiny, instead of discovering in the 
Madras government any appearances of temper and 
" 'wisdom, they appear to us to have been quite as much 
irritated, and heated as the army, and to have been be- 
trayed iuto excesses nearly as criminal, and infinitely 
more contemptible and puerile. The head of a great 
kingdom bickering with his officers about invitations 
to dinner — the commander-in-chief of the forces nego- 
tiating that the dinner should be loyally eaten — the 
obstinate absurdity of the test — the total want of se- 
lection in the objects of punishment — and the wicked- 
ness, or the insanity, of teaching the Sepoy to rise 
against his European officer — the contempt of the 
decision of juries in civil cases — and the punishment of 
the juries themselves; such a system of conduct as 
this would infallibly doom any individual to punish- 
ment, if it -did not, fortunately for him, display pre- 
cisely that contempt of men's feelings, and that pass- 
ion for insulting multitudes, which is so congenial to 
our present government at home, and which passes 
now so currently for wisdom and courage. By these 
means, the liberties of great nations are frequently de- 
stroyed — and destroyed with impunity to the perpe- 
trators of the crime. In distant colonies, however, 
governors who attempt the same system of tyranny 
are in no little danger from the indignation of their 
subjects; for though men will often yield up their 
happiness to kings who have been always kings, they 
are not inclined to show the same deference to men 
who have been merchants' clerks yesterday, and are 
kings to-day. From a danger of this kind, the gover- 
nor of Madras appears to us to have very narrowly 
escaped. We sincerely hope that he is grateful for his 
goocf luck ; and that he will now awake from his gor- 
geous dreams of mercantile monarchy, to goodnature, 
moderation, and common sense. 



BISHOP OF LINCOLN'S CHARGE* (Edinburgh 
Review, 1813.) 

A Charge delivered to the Clergy of the Diocese of Lincoln, at 
the Triennial Vistation of that Diocese in May, June, and 
July, 1812. By George Tomline, D. D., F. R. S., Lord 
Bishop of Lincoln. London. Cadell & Co. 4to. 
It is a melancholy thing to see a man, clothed in soft 
raiment, lodged in a public palace, endowed with a rich 
portion of the product of other men's industry, using all 
the influence of his splendid situation, however conscien- 
tiously, to deepen the ignorance, andinflame the fury, of 
his fellow-creatures. These are the miserable results of 
that policy which has been so frequently pursued for 
these fifty years past, of placing men of mean, or middling 
abilities, in high ecclesiastical stations. In ordinary 
times, it is of less importance' who fills them • but when 
the bitter period arrives, in which the people must give 
up some of their darling absurdities ; — when the senseless 
clamour, which has been carefully handed down from 
father fool to son fool, can be no longer indulged ; — when 
■His of incalculable importance to turn the people to abet- 
ter way of thinking ; the greatest impediments to all ame- 
lioration are too often found among those to whose coun- 
cils, at such periods, the country ought to look for wis- 
dom and peace. We will suppress, however, the feel- 
ings of indignation which such productions, from such 
men, naturally occasion. We will give the Bishop of 
Lincoln credit for being perfectly sincere; we will sup- 
pose, that every argument he uses has not been used 
and refuted ten thousand times before ; and we will sit 
down as patiently to defend the religious liberties of 

* It is impossible to conceive the mischief which this mean 
and cunning prelate did at this period. 



mankind, as the reverend prelate has done to abridge 

them. 

We must begin with denying the main position up- 
on which the Bishop of Lincoln has built his reason- 
ing — The Catholic Religionis not tolerated in England. 
No man can be fairly said to be permitted to enjoy 
his own worship who is punished for exercising that 
worship. His lordship seems to have no other idea 
of punishment, than lodging a man in the Poultry 
compter, or flogging him at the cart's tail, or fining 
him a sum of money; — just as if incapacitating a man 
from enjoying the dignities and emoluments to which 
men of 'similar condition, and other faith, may fairly 
aspire, was not frequently the most severe and gall- 
ing of all punishments. This limited idea of the na- 
ture of punishment is the more extraordinary, as inca- 
pacitation is actually one of the most common punish 
ments in some branches of our law. The sentence of 
a court-martial frequently purports, that a man is ren- 
dered for ever incapable of serving his majesty, &c. 
&c; and a person not in holy orders, who performs 
the functions of a clergyman, is rendered for over in- 
capable of holding any preferment in the church. 
There are, indeed, many species of offence for which 
no punishment more apposite and judicious could be 
devised. It would be rather extraordinary, however, 
if the court, in passing such a sentence, were to as- 
sure the culprit, { that such incapacitation was not by 
them considered as a punishment ; that it was only 
exercising a right inherent in all governments, of de- 
termining who should be eligible for office and who 
ineligible.' His lordship thinks the toleration com- 
plete/because he sees a permission in the statutes for 
the exercise of the Roman Catholic worship. He sees 
the permission — but he does not choose to see the 
consequences to which they are exposed who avail 
themselves of this permission. It is the liberality ot 
a father who says to his son, l Do as you please, my 
dear boy; follow your own inclination. Judge for 
yourself; you are as free as air. But remember, if 
you marry that lady, I will cut you off with a shilling.' 
We have scarcely ever read a more solemn and frivo- 
lous statement than the Bishop of Lincoln's antitheti- 
cal distinction between persecution and the denial of 
political power. 

< It is sometimes said, that papists, being excluded from 
power, are consequently persecuted ; as if exclusion from 
power and religious persecution were convertible terms. 
But surely this is to confound things totally distinct in their 
nature. Persecution inflicts positive punishment upon per- 
sons who hold certain religious tenets, and endeavours to 
accomplish the renunciation and extinction of those tenets 
by forcible means : exclusion from power is entirely nega- 
tive in its operation — it only declares, that those who hold 
certain opinions shall not fill certain situations ; but it ac 
knowledges men to be perfectly free to hold those opinions. 
Persecution compels men to adopt a prescribed faith, or to 
suffer the loss of liberty, property, or even life : exclusion 
from power prescribes no faith ; it allows men to think and 
believe as they please, without molestation or interference. 
Persecution requires men to worship God in one and in no 
other way ; exclusion from power neither commands nor 
forbids any mode of divine worship — it leaves the business 
of religion, where it ought to be left, to every man's judg- 
ment and conscience. Persecution proceeds from a bigoted 
and sanguinary spirit of intolerance ; exclusion from power 
is founded in the natural and rational principle of self-pro- 
tection and self-preservation, equally applicable to nations 
and to individuals. History informs us of the mischievous 
and fatal effects of the one, and proves the expediency and 
necessity of the other.' — (pp. 16, 17.) 

We will venture to say, there is no one sentence in 
this extract which does not contain either a contra- 
diction, or a misstatement. For how can that law ac- 
knowledge men to be perfectly free to hold an opini- 
on, which excludes from desirable situations all who 
hold that opinion ? How can that law be said neither 
to molest, nor interfere, which meets a man in every 
branch of industry and occupation, to institute an in- 
quisition into his religious opinions ? And how is the 
business of religion left to every man's own judgment 
and conscience, where so powerful a bonus is given to 
one set of religious opinions, and such a mark of infa- 
my and degradation fixed upon all other modes of 
belief? But this is comparatively a very idle part of 



BISHOP OF LINCOLN'S CHARGE 



213 



the question. Whether the present condition of the 
Catholics is or is not to be denominated a perfect 
State of toleration, is more a controversy of words than 
things. That they are subject to some restraints, the 
bishop will admit : the important question is, whether 
or not these restraints are necessary ? For his lord- 
ship will, of course, allow, that every restraint upon 
human liberty is an evil in itself : and can only be jus- 
tified by the superior good which it can be shown to 
Sroduce. My lord's fears upon the subject of Catho- 
c emancipation are conveyed in the following para- 
graph : 

* It is a principle of our constitution, that the.king should 
have advisers in the discharge of every part of his royal 
functions— and is itto be imagined that Papists would advise 
measures in support of the cause of Protestantism ? A si- 
milar observation may be applied to the two Houses of 
Parliament : would Popish peers or Popish members of the 
House of Commons, enact laws for the security of the Pro- 
testant government ? Would they not rather repeal the 
whole Protestant code, and make Popery again the estab- 
lished religion of the country?'— (p. 14.) 

And these are the apprehensions which the clergy 
of the diocese have prayed my lord to make public. 

Kind Providence never sends an evil without a rem- 
edy : — and arithmetic is the natural cure for the pas- 
sion of fear. If a coward can be made to count his 
enemies, his terrors may be reasoned with, and he may 
think of ways and means of counteraction. Now, 
might it not have been expedient that the reverend 
prelate, before he had alarmed his country clergy with 
the idea of so large a measure as the repeal of Protes- 
tantism, should have counted up the probable number 
of Catholics who would be seated in both houses of 
Parliament ? Does he believe that there would be ten 
Catholic peers, and thirty Catholic commoners ? But, 
admit double that number, (and more, Dr. Duigenan 
himself would not ask,) — will the Bishop of Lincoln se- 
riously assert, that he thinks the whole Protestant 
code in danger of repeal from such an admixture of 
Catholic legislators as this ? Does he forget, amid the 
innumerable answers which may be made to such sort 
of apprehensions, what a picture he is drawing of the 
weakness and versatility of Protestant principles? — 
that an handful of Catholics, in the bosom of a Protes- 
tant legislature, is to overpower the ancient jealousies, 
the fixed opinions, the inveterate habits of twelve mil- 
lions of people? — that the king is to apostatize, the 
clergy to be silent, and the Parliament to be taken by 
surprise ? — that the nation is to go to bed over night, 
and to see the Pope walking arm in arm with Lord 
Castlereagh the next morning ? — One would really sup- 
pose, from the bishop's fears, that the civil defences 
of mankind were, like their military bulwarks, trans- 
ferred, by superior skill and courage, in a few hours, 
from the vanquished to the victor — that the distrac- 
tion of a church was like the blowing up of a mine, — 
deans, prebendaries, churchwardens and overseers, all 
up in the air in an instant. Does his lordship really 
imagine, when the mere dread of the Catholics becom- 
ing legislators has induced him to charge his clergy, 
and his agonized clergy, to extort from their prelate 
the publication of the charge, that the full and mature 
danger will produce less alarm than the distant suspi- 
cion of it has done in the present instance ? — that the 
Protestant writers, whose pens are now up to the fea- 
ther in ink, will at any future period, yield up their 
church without passion, pamphlet, or pugnacity ? We 
do not blame the Bishop of Lincon for being afraid ; 
but we blame him for not rendering his fears intelligi- 
ble and tangible — for not circumscribing and particu- 
larizing them by some individual case — for not show- 
ing us how it is possible that the Catholics (granting 
their intentions to be as bad as possible) should ever 
be able to ruin the Church of England. His lordship 
appears to be in a fog ? and as daylight breaks in upon 
him, he will be rather disposed to disown his panic. 
The noise he hears is not roaring, — but braying ; the 
teeth and the mane are all imaginary ; there is noth- 
ing but ears. It is not a lion that stops the way, but 
an ass. 

One method his lordship takes, in handling this ques- 
tion, is by pointing out dangers that are barely possible, 



and then treating of them as if the} deserved the ac- 
tive and present attention of serious men. But if no 
measure is to be carried into execution, and if no pro- 
vision is safe in which the minute inspection of an in- 
genious man cannot find the possibility of danger, then 
all inhuman action is impeded, and no human institu- 
tion is safe or commendable. The king has the power 
of pardoning, — and so every species of guilt may re- 
mam unpunished : he has a negative upon legislative 
acts, and so no law may pass. None but Presbyteri- 
ans may be returned to the House of Commons, — and 
so the Church of England may be voted down. The 
Scottish and Irish members may join together in both 
houses, and dissolve both unions. If probability is put 
out of sight, — and if, in the enumeration of dangers, it 
is sufficient to state any which, by remote con'tingen- 
cy, may happen, then it is time we should begin to 
provide against all the host of perils which we have 
just enumerated, and which are many of them as like- 
ly to happen, as those which the reverend prelate has 
stated in his charge. His lordship forgets that the 
Catholics are not asking for election but for elegibility 
— not to be admitted into the cabinet, but not to be 
excluded from it. A century may elapse before any 
Catholic actually becomes a member of the cabinet ; 
and no event can be more utterly destitute of probabil- 
ity, than that they should gain an ascendency there, 
and direct that ascendency against the Protestant in- 
terest. If the bishop really wishes to know upon what 
our security is founded ; — it is upon the prodigious and 
decided superiority of the Protestant interest in the Brit- 
ish nation, and in the United Parliament. No Protest- 
ant king would select such a cabinet, or countenance 
such measures ; no man would be mad enough to at- 
tempt them ; the English Parliament and the English 
people would not endure it for a moment. No man, 
indeed, under the sanctity of the mitre, would have 
ventured such an extravagant opinion. — Wo to him, if 
he had been only a dean. But, in spite of his venera- 
ble office, we must express our decided belief, that his 
lordship (by no means adverse to a good bargain) 
would not pay down five pounds, to receive fifty mil- 
lion for his posterity, whether the majority of the 
cabinet should be (Catholic emancipation carried) 
members of the Catholic religion. And. yet, upon such 
terrors as these, which, when put singly to him, his 
better senses would'laugh at, he has thought fit to ex- 
cite his clergy to petition, and done all in his power to 
increase the mass of hatred against the Catholics. 

It is true enough, as his lordship remarks, that 
events do not depend upon laws alone, but upon the 
wishes and intentions of those who administer these 
laws. But then his lordship totally puts out of sight 
two considerations — the improbability of Catholics 
ever reaching the highest offices of the state — and 
those fixed Protestant opmions of the country, which 
would render any attack upon the established church 
so hopeless and, therefore, so improbable. Admit a 
supposition (to us perfectly ludicrous, but still neces- 
sary to the bishop's argument), that the cabinet coun- 
cil consisted entirely of Catholics, we should even 
then have no more fear of their making the English 
people Catholics, than we should have of a cabinet of 
butchers making the Hindoos eat beef. The bishop 
has not stated the true and great security for any 
course of human actions. It is not the word of the 
law, nor the spirit of the government, but the general 
way of thinking among the people, especially when 
that way of thinking is ancient, exercised upon high 
interests, and connected with striking passages in his- 
tory. The Protestant church does not rest upon the 
little narrow foundations where the Bishop of Lincoln 
supposes it to be placed : if it did, it would not be 
worth saving. It rests upon the general opinion enter- 
tained by a free and reflecting people, that the doc- 
trines of the church are true, her pretensions moderate, 
and her exhortations useful. It is accepted by a peo- 
ple who have, from good taste, an abhorrence of sa- 
cerdotal mummery ; and from good sense, a dread of 
sacerdotal ambition. Those feelings, so generally 
diffused, and so clearly pronounced on all occasions, 
are our real bulwarks against the Catholic religion, and 
the real cause which makes it so safe for the best 



214 



WORKS OF THE REV. SIDNEY SMITH. 



friends of the church to diminish (by abolishing the 
test laws), so very fertile a source of hatred to the 
state. 

In the loth page of his lordship's charge, there is an 
argument of a very curious nature. 

' Let us suppose,' (says the Bishop of Lincoln), « that 
there had been no test laws, no disabling statutes, in the 
year 1745, when an attempt was made to overthrow the 
Protestant government, and to place a popish sovereign up- 
on the throne of these kingdoms ; and' let us suppose, that 
the leading men in the houses of Parliament, that the min- 
isters of state, and the commanders of our armies, had then 
been Papists. Will any one contend, that that formidable 
rebellion, supported as it was by a foreign enemy, would 
have been resisted with the same zeal, and suppressed with 
the same facility, as when all the measures were planned 
and executed by sincere Protestants !' — (p. 15.) 

And so his lordship means to infer, that it would be 
foolish to abolish the laws against the Catholics now, 
because it would have been foolish to have abolished 
them at some other period ; — that a measure must be 
bad, because there was formerly a combination of cir- 
cumstances, when it would have been bad. His lord- 
ship might, with almost equal propriety, debate what 
ought to be done if Julius Caesar were about to make 
a descent upon our coasts ; or lament the impropriety 
of emancipating the Catholics, because the Spanish 
Armada was putting to sea. The fact is, that Julius 
Caesar is dead — the Spanish Armada was defeated in 
the reign of Queen Elizabeth — for half a century 
there has been no disputed succession — the situation 
of the world is changed — and, because it is changed, 
we can do now what we could not do then. And no- 
thing can be more lamentable than to see this respec- 
table prelate wasting his resources in putting imagin- 
ary and inapplicable cases, and reasoning upon their 
solution, as if they had anything to do with present 
affairs. 

These remarks entirely put an end to the common 
mode of arguing a Gulielmo. What did King William 
do ? — what would King William say? &c. King Wil- 
liam was in a very different situation from that in 
which we are placed. The whole world was in a very 
different situation. The great and glorious authors of 
the Revolution (as they are commonly denominated) 
acquired their greatness and glory, not by a supersti- 
tious reverence for inapplicable precedents, but by 
taking hold of present circumstances to lay a deep 
foundation for liberty ; and then using old names for 
new things, they left the Bishop of Lincoln, and other 
men, to suppose that they had been thinking all the 
time about ancestors. 

Another species of false reasoning, which pervades 
the Bishop of Lincoln's charge is this : He states 
what the interests of men are, and then takes it for 
granted that they will eagerly and actively pursue 
them ; laying totally out of the question the probabil- 
ity or improbability of their effecting their object, and 
the influence which this balance of chances must pro* 
dnoe upon their actions. For instance, it is the inte- 
rest of the Catholics that our church should be subser- 
vient to theirs. Therefore, says his lordship, the 
Catholics will enter into a conspiracy against the Eng- 
lish church. But, is it not also the decided inte- 
rest of his lordship's butler that he should be bishop, 
and the bishop his butler? That the crozier and the 
corkscrew should change hands, — and the washer of 
the bottles which they had emptied become the dio- 
cesan of learned divines ? What has prevented this 
change, so beneficial to the upper domestic, but the 
extreme improbability of success, if the attempt were 
made ; an improbability so great, that we will venture 
to say, the very notion of it has scarcely once entered 
into the understanding of the good man. Why, then, 
is the reverend prelate, who lives on so safely and con- 
tentedly with John, so dreadfully alarmed at the Cath- 
olics ? And why does he so completely forget, in their 
instance alone, that men do not merely strive to ob- 
tain a thing because it is good, but always mingle with 
the excellence of the object a consideration of the 
chance of gaining it. 

The Bishop of Lincoln (p. 19,) states it as an argu- 
ment against concession to the Catholics, that we have 



enjoyed l internal peace and entire freedom from all 
religious animosities and feuds, since the Revolution.' 
The fact, however, is not more certain than conclu- 
sive against his view of the question. For, since that 
period, the worship of the Church of England has 
been abolished in Scotland — the corporation and test 
acts repealed in Ireland — and the whole of this king's 
reign has been one series of concessions to the Catho- 
lics. Relaxation, then, (and we wish this had been 
remembered at the charge) of penal laws, on subjects 
of religious opinion, is perfectly compatible with inter- 
nal peace, and exemption from religious animosity. — 
But the bishop Is always fond of lurking in generals, 
and cautiously avoids coming to any specific instance 
of the dangers which he fears. 

' It is declared in one of the 39 Articles, that the king is 
head of our church, without being subject to any foreign 
power ; and it is expressly said, that the Bishop of Rome 
has no jurisdiction within these realms. On the contrary, 
Papists assert, that the Pope is supreme head of the whole 
Christian church, and that allegiance is due to him from 
every individual member, in all spiritual matters. This di- 
rect opposition to one of the fundamental principles of the 
ecclesiastical part of our constitution, is alone sufficient to 
justify the exclusion of Papists from all situations of au- 
thority. They acknowledge, indeed, that obedience in ci- 
vil matters is due to the king. But cases must arise, in 
which civil and religious duties will clash ; and he knows 
but little of the influence of the Popish religion over the 
mind of its votaries, who doubts which of these duties 
would be sacrificed to the other. Moreover, the most subtle 
casuistry cannot always discriminate between temporal and 
spiritual things ; and in truth, the concerns of this life not 
unfrequently partake of both characters.' — (pp. 21, 22.) 

We deny entirely that any case can occur, where 
the exposition of a doctrine purely speculative, or the 
arrangement of a mere point of church discipline, can 
interfere with civil duties. The Roman Catholics are 
Irish and English citizens at this moment ; but no 
such case has occurred. There is no instance in which 
obedience to the civil magistrate has been prevented, 
by an acknowledgment of the spiritual supremacy of 
the pope. The Catholics have given (in an oath which 
we suspect the bishop never to have read) the most 
solemn pledge, that their submission to I heir spiritual 
ruler should never interfere with their civil obedience. 
The hypothesis of the Bishop of Lincoln is, that it 
must very often do so. The fact is that it has never 
done so. 

His lordship is extremely angry with the Catholics 
for refusing 10 the crown a veto upon the appointment of 
their bishops. He forgets, that in those countries of Eu- 
rope where the crown interferes with the appointment 
of bishops, the reigning monarch is a Catholic,— which 
makes all the difference. We sincerely wish that the 
Catholics would concede this point ; but we cannot be 
astonished at their reluctano* to admit the interfe- 
rence of a Protestant prince with their bishops. What 
would his lordship say to the interference of any 
Catholic power with the appointment of the English 
sees ? 

Next comes the stale and thousand times refuted 
charge against the Catholics, that they think the pope 
has the power of dethroning heretical kings ; and that 
it is the duty of every Catholic to use every possible 
means to root out and destroy heretics, &c. To all of 
which may be returned this one conclusive answer, 
that the Catholics are ready to deny these doctrines 
upon oath. And as the whole controversy is, whether 
the Catholics shall, by means of oaths, be excluded 
from certain offices in the state ; — those who contend 
that the continuance of these excluding oaths is essen- 
tial to the public safety, must admit, that oaths are 
binding upon Catholics, and a security to the state that 
what they swear to is true. 

It is right to keep these things in view — and to omit 
no opportunity of exposing and counteracting that 
spirit of intolerant zeal or intolerable time-serving, 
which has so long disgraced and endangered this 
country. But the "truth is, that we look upon this 
cause as already gained ; — and while we warmly con- 
gratulate the nation on the mighty step it has recently 
made towards increased power and entire security, it 
is impossible to avoid saying a word upon the humili 



MADAME D'EPINAY. 



215 



ating and disgusting, but at the same time most edify- 
ing spectacle, which has lately been exhibited by the 
anti-Catholic addressers. That so great a number of 
persons should have been found with such a proclivity 
to servitude (for honest bigotry had but little to do 
with the matter), as to rush forward with clamours in 
favour of intolerance, upon a mere surmise that this 
would be accounted as acceptable service by the pres- 
ent possessors of patronage and power, affords a more 
humiliating and discouraging picture of the present 
spirit of the country, than any thing else that has oc- 
curred in our remembrance. The edifying part of the 
spectacle is the contempt with which their officious 
devotions have been received by those whose favour 
they were intended to purchase, — and the universal 
scorn and derision with which they were regarded by 
independent men of all parties and persuasions. The 
catastrophe, we think, teaches two lessons ; — one to 
the time-servers themselves, not to obtrude their ser- 
vility on the government, till they have reasonable 
ground to think it is wanted; — and the other to the 
nation at large, not to imagine that a base and inter- 
ested clamour in favour of what is supposed to be 
agreeable to government, however loudly and exten- 
sively sounded, affords any indication at all, either of 
the general sense of the country, or even of what is 
actually contemplated by those in the administration 
of its affairs. The real sense of the country has been 
proved, on this occasion, to be directly against those 
who presumptuously held themselves out as its or- 
gans ; — and even the ministers have made a respecta- 
able figure, compared with those who assumed the 
character of their champions. 



MADAME D'EPINAY. (Edinburgh Review, 1818.) 

Memoires et Correspondence de Madame D'Epinay. 3 vols. 
8vo. Paris, 1818. 

There used to be in Paris, under the ancient regime, 
a few women of brilliant talents, who violated all the 
common duties of life, and gave very pleasant little 
suppers. Among these supped and sinned Madame' 
d'Epinay — the friend and companion of Rousseau, Di- 
derot, Grimm, Holbach, and many other literary per- 
sons of distinction of that period. Her principal lover 
was Grimm ; with whom was deposited, written in 
feigned names, the history of her life. Grimm died— 
his secretary sold the history — the feigned names 
have been exchanged for the real ones — and her works 
now appear abridged in three volumes octavo. 

Madame d'Epinay, though far from an immaculate 
character, has something to say in palliation of her ir- 
regularities. Her husband behaved abominably ; and 
alienated, by a series of the most brutal injuries, an 
attachmeht which seems to have been very ardent 
and sincere, and which, with better treatment would 
probably have been lasting. For, in all her aberra- 
tions, Mad. d'Epinay seems to have had a tendency to 
be constant. Though extremely young when separa- 
rated from her husband, she indulged herself with but 
two lovers for the rest of her life ;— to the first of 
whom she seems to have been perfectly faithful, till he 
left her at the end of ten or twelve years ;--and to 
Grimm, by whom he was succeeded, she seems to 
have given no rival till the day of her death. The 
account of the life she led, both with her husband and 
her lovers, brings upon the scene a great variety of 
French characters, and lays open very completely the 
interior of French life and manners. But there are 
some letters and passages which ought not to have 
been published ; which a sense of common decency 
and morality ought to have suppressed ; and which, 
we feel assured, would never have seen the light in 
this country. 

A French woman seems almost always to have 
wanted the flavour of prohibition as a necessary con- 
diment to human life. The provided husband was re- 
jected, and the forbidden husband introduced in ambi- 
guous light, through posterns and secret partitions. It 
was not the union to one man that was objected to — 
for they dedicated themselves with a constancy which 



the most household and parturient woman in England 
could not exceed ; — but the thing wanted was the 
wrong man, the gentleman without the ring — the mas- 
ter unsworn to at the altar — the person unconsecrated 
by priests — 

'Oh! let me taste thee unexcis'd by kings.' 

The following strikes us as a very lively picture of 
the ruin and extravagance of a fashionable house in a 
great metropolis. 

' M. d'Epinay a complete son domestique. II a trois 
laquais, et moi deux ; je n'en ai pas voulu davantage. II a 
un valet de chambre ; et il vouloit aussi que je prisse une 
seconde femme, mais comme je n'en ai que faire, j'ai tenu 
bon. Enfin les officiers, les femmes, les valets se montent 
au nombre de seize. Quoique la vie que je mene soit aasez 
uniforme, j'espere n'etre pas obligee d'en changer. Celle 
de M. d'Epinay est difierente. Lorsqu'il est leve, son valet 
de chambre se met en devoir de l'accommoder. Deux la- 
quais sont debout d attendre ordres. Le premier secretaire 
vient avec l'intention de lui rendre compte des lettres qu'il 
a recues de son department, et qu'il est charge d'ouvrir ; il 
doit lire les reponses et les faire signer ; mais il est inter- 
rompu deux cents fois dans cette occupation par toutes 
sortes d'especes imaginables. C'est un maquignon qui a 
des chevaux uniques d vendre, mais qui sont retenus par un 
seigneur: ainsi il est venu pour ne pas manquer a sa parole; 
car on lui en donneroit le double, qu'on ne pourroit faire. 
II en fait une description seduisante, on demande le prix. 
Le seigneur un tel en offre soixante louis. — Je vous en 
donne cent.— Cela est inutile, a moins qu'il ne se dedise. 
Cependant Ton conclut a cent louis sans les avoir vus, car 
le lendemain le seigneur ne manque pas de se dedire: voild 
ce que j'ai vu et entendu la semaine derniere. 

' Ensuite c'est un polisson qui vient brailler un ah-, et d 
qui on accorde sa protection pour le faire entrer a l'Opera, 
apres lui avoir donne quelques legons de bon gout, et lui 
avoir appris ce que c'est que la proprete du chant frangois; 
c'est une demoiselle qu'on fait attendre pour savoir si je 
suis encore Id. Je me leve et je m'en vais ; les deux laquais 
ouvrent les deux battans pour me laisser sortir, moi qui 
passerois alors par le trou d'une aiguille ; et les deux esta- 
fiers crient dans l'anti-chambre : Madame, messieurs, voild 
madame. Tout le monde se range en haie, et ces messieurs 
sont des marchands d'etoffes, des marchands d'instrumens, 
des bijoutiers, des colporteurs, des laquais, des decroteurs, 
des creanciers ; enfin tout ce que vous pouvez imaginer de 
plus ridicule et de plus affligeant. Midi ou une heure sonne 
avant que cette toilette soit achevee, et le secretaire, qui, 
sans doute, sait par experience l'impossibilite de rendre un 
compte detaille des affaires, a un petit bordereau qu'il remet 
entre les mains de son maitre pour l'instruire de ce qu'il 
doit dire a l'assemblee. Une autre fois il sort a pied ou en 
fiacre, rentre a deux heures, fait comme un bruleur de mai- 
son, dine tete a tete avec moi, ou admet en tiers son premier 
secretaire qui lui parle de la necessity de fixer chaque article 
de depense, de donner des delegations pour tel ou tel objet. 
La seule reponse est : Nous verrons cela. Ensuite il court 
le monde et les spectacles ; et il soupe en ville quand il n'a 
personne d souper chez lui. Je vois que mon temps de 
repos est fini.'— I. pp. 308—310. 

A very prominent person among the early friends of 
Madame d'Epinay, is Mademoiselle d'Ette, a woman 
of great French respectability, and circulating in the 
best society; and, as we are painting French manners, 
we shall make no apology to the serious part of our 
English readers, for inserting this sketch of her histo- 
ry and character by her own hand. 

1 Je connois, me dit-elle ensuite, votre franchise et votre 
discretion : dites-moi naturellement quelle opinion on a de 
mois dans le monde. La meilleure, lui dis-je, et telle que 
vous ne pourriez la conserver si vous pratiquiez la morale 
que vous venez de me precher. Voild oii je vous attendois, 
me det-elle. Depuis dix ans que j'ai perdu ma mere, je fus 
seduite par le chevalier de Valory qui m'avoit vu, pour 
ainsi dire, elever ; mon extreme jeunesse et la confiance 
que j'avois en luine me permirent pas d'abord de me defier 
de ses vues. Je fus longtemps d m'en apercevoir, et lorsque 
je m'en apergus, j'avois pris tant de gout pour lui, queje 
n'eus pas la force de lui resister. II me vint des scrupules ; 
il les leva, en me promettant de m'epouser. II y travailla 
en etfet ; mais voyant l'opposition que sa famille y 
apportoit, d cause de la disproportion d'age et de mon peu 
de fortune ; et me trouvant, d'ailleurs, heureuse comme 
j'etors, je fus la premiere a etouffer mes scrupules, d'autant 
plus qu'il est assez pauvre. II commengoit d faire des 
reflexions, je lui proposal de continuer a vivre comme nous 
etions ; il l'accepta. Je quittai ma province, et je le suivis 
d Paris ; vous voyez comme j'y vis. Quatre fois la semaine 
il passe sa journee chez moi ; le reste du temps nous nous 



216 



WORKS OF THE REV. SIDNEY SMITH. 



contentons reciproquement d'apprendre de nos nouvelles, 
d moies que le hasard ne nous fasse rencontrer. Nous 
vivons heureux, contens ; peut-etre ne le serions nous pas 
tant si nous etions maries.'— I. pp. Ill, 112. 

This seems a very spirited, unincumbered way of 
passing through life ; and it is some comfort, therefore. 
to a matrimonial English reader, to find Mademoiselle 
d'Ette kicking the chevalier out of doors towards the 
end of the second volume. As it is a scene very edi- 
fying to rakes, and those who decry the happiness of 
the married state, we shall give it in the words of Ma- 
dame d'Epinay. 

1 Une nuit, dont elle avert passe las plus grande partie 
dans l'inquietude, elle entre chez le chevalier : il dormoit; 
elle le reveille, s'assied sur son lit, et entame une explica- 
tion avec toute la violence et la fureur qui l'animoient. Le 
chevalier, apres avoir employe vainement, pour le calmer, 
tous les moyens que sa bonte naturelle lui suggera, lui 
signifia enfin tres-jJrecisement qu'il alloit se separer d'elle 
pour toujours, et fuir un enfer auquel il ne pouvoit plus 
tenir. Cette confidence, qui n'etoit pas faite pour l'appaiser, 
redoubla sa rage. Puisqu'il est ainsi, dit-elle, sortez tout a 
l'heure de chez moi; vous deviez parfir dans quatre jours, 
c'est vous rendre service de vous faire partir dans l'instant. 
Tout ce qui est ici m'appartient ; le bail est en mon nom : 
il ne me convient plus de vous souffrir chez moi : levez- 
vous, monsieur, et songez a ne rien emporter sans ma per- 
mission.'— II. pp. 193, 194. 

Our English method of asking leave to separate from 
Sir William Scott and Sir John Nicol is surely better 
than this. 

Any one who provides good dinners for clever peo- 
ple, and remembers what they say, cannot fail to write 
entertaining Memoires. Among the early friends of 
Madame d'Epinay was Jean Jacques Rousseau — she 
lived with him in considerable intimacy ; and no small 
part of her book is taken up with accounts of his eccen- 
tricity, insanity, and vice. 

f Nous avons debutee par V Engagement temeraire, comedie 
nouvelle, de M. Rousseau, ami de Francueil qui nous l'a 
presente. L'auteur a joue un role dans sa piece. Quoique 
ce ne soit qu'une comedie de societe, elle a eu un grand 
succes. Je doute cependant qu'elle put reussir au theatre ; 
inais c'est l'ouvrage d'un homme de beaucoup d'esprit, et 
peut-etre d'un homme singulier. Je ne sais pas trop ce- 
pendant si c'est ce que j'ai vu de l'auteur ou de la piece qui 
me fait juger ainsi. II est complimenteur sans etre poli, ou 
au moins sans en avoir l'air. II paroit ignorer les usages 
du monde; mais il est aise de voir qu'il a infiniment d'es- 
prit. II a le teint brun : et des yeux pleins de feu animent 
sa physionomie. Lorsqu'il a parle et qu'on le regarde, il 

f>aroit joli ; mais lorsqu'on se le rappelle, c'est touiours en 
aid. On dit qu'il est d'une mauvaise sante, et qu'il a des 
sounrances' qu'il. cache avec soin, parjene sais quel prin- 
cipe de vanite ; c'est apparemment cequi lui donne, de temps 
en temps, l'air farouche. M.deBellegarde, avec qui il a cause 
long-temps, ce matin, en est enchante, et Id engage a nous 
venir voir souvent. J'en suis bien aise; je me promets de 
profiter beaucoup de sa conversation.' — I. pp. 175, 176. 

Their friendship so formed, proceeded to a great 
degree of intimacy. Madame d'Epinay admired his 
genius, and provided him with hats and coats ; and, at 
last, was so far deluded by his declamations about the 
country, as to fit him up a little hermit cottage, where 
there were a great many birds, and a great many plants 
and flowers — and where Rousseau was, as might have 
been expected, supremely miserable. His friends 
from Paris did not come to see him. The postman, 
the butcher, and the baker, hate romantic scenery — 
duchesses and marchionesses were no longer found to 
scramble for him. Among the real inhabitants of the 
country, the reputation of reading and thinking is fatal 
to character ; and Jean Jacques cursed his own suc- 
cessful eloquence which had sent him from the suppers 
and flattery of Paris to smell to daffodils, watch spar- 
rows, or project idle saliva into the passing stream. 
Very few men who have gratified, and are gratify ing 
their vanity in a great metropolis, are qualified to quit 
it. Few have the plain sense to perceive, that they 
must soon inevitably be forgotten, — or the fortitude 
to bear it when they are. They represent to them- 
selves imaginary scenes of deploring friends and dis- 
pirited companions — but the ocean might as well re- 
gret the drops exhaled by the sun-beams. Life goes 
on ; and whether the absent have retired into a cottage 



or a grave, is much the same thing. — In London, 
as in law, de non apparentibus, et non existentibus eadem 
est ratio. 

This is the account Madame d'Epinay gives of 
Rousseau soon after he had retired into the hermitage. 

< J'ai ete il y a deux jours a la ChevTette, pour terminer 
quelques affaires avant de m'y etablir avec mes enfans. 
J'avois fait prevenir Rousseau de mon voyage: il est venu 
me voir. Je crois qu'il a besoin de ma presence, et que la 
solitude a deja agite sa bile. II se plaint de tout le monde. 
Diderot doit toujours aller, et ne va jamais le voir; M. 
Grimm le neglige ; le Baron d'Holbach l'ouble ; Gauffecourt 
et moi seulement avons encore des egards pour lui, dit-il ; 
j'ai voulu les justifier; cela n'a pas reussi. J'espere qu'il 
sera beaucoup plus a la Chevrette qu' a l'Hermitage. Je 
suis persuadee qu'il n'y a que facon de prendre cet homme 
pour le rendre heureux ; c'est de feindre de ne pas prendre 
garde a lui, et s'en- occuper sans cesse ; c'est pour cela que 
je n'insistai point pour le retenir, lorsqu'il m'eut dit qu'il 
vouloit s'en retourner a l'Hermitage, quoiqu'il fut tard et 
malgre le mauvais temps.' — II. pp. 253, 254. 

Jean Jacques Rousseau seems, as the reward of 
genius and fine writiug, to have claimed an exemption 
from all moral duties. He borrowed and begged, and 
never paid ; — put his children in a poor house — betray- 
ed his friends — insulted his benefactors — and was guil- 
ty of every species of meanness and mischief. His 
vanity was so great, that it was almost impossible to 
keep pace with it by any activity of attention ; and 
his suspicion of all mankind amounted nearly, if not 
altogether, to insanity. The following anecdote, how- 
ever, is totally clear of any symptom of derangement, 
and carries only the most rooted and disgusting selfish- 
ness. 

< Rousseau vous a done dit qu'il n'avoit pas porte son 
ouvrage a Paris ? II en a menti, car il n'a fait son voyage 
que pour cela. J'ai recu hier une lettre de Diderot, qui 
peint votre hermite comme si je le voyois. II a fait ces 
deux lieues a pied, est venu s'etablir chez Diderot sans 
l'avoir prevenu, le tout pour faire avec lui la revision de 
son ouvrage. Au point ou ils en etoient ensemble, vous 
conviendrez que cela est assez etrange. Je vois, par cer- 
tains mots echappes a mon ami dans sa lettre, qu'il a quel- 
que sujet de discussion entre eux ; mais comme il ne s'ex- 
plique point, je n'y comprends rien. Rousseau l'a tenu 
impitoyablement a l'ouvrage depuis le Samedi dix heures 
du matin jusqu'au Lundi onze heures du soir, sans lui don- 
ner a piene le temps de boire ni manger. La revision finie, 
Diderot cause avec lui d'un plan qu'il a dans la tete, prie 
Rousseau de l'aider a arranger un incident qui n'est pas 
encour trouve a sa fantaisie. Cela est trop difficile, repond 
froidement Thermite, il est tard, je ne suis point accoutume 
a veiller. Bon soir, je pars demain a six heures du matin, 
il est temps de dormir. II se leve, va se coucher, et laisse 
Diderot petrifie de son procede. Voila cet homme que vous 
croyez si penetre de vos lecons. Adjoutez a cette reflexion 
un propos singulier de la femme de Diderot, dont je vous 
prie de faire votre profit. Cette femme n'est qu'une bonne 
femme, mais elle a la tact juste. Voyant son mari desole 
le jour du depart de Rousseau, elle lui en demande la rai- 
son ; il la lui dit : C'est le manque de delicatesse de cet 
homme, ajoute-t-il, qui m'afflige ; il me fait travailler comme 
un manoeuvre, je ne m'en serois, je crois pas apercu, se il 
ne m'avoit refuse aussi sechement de s'occuper pourmoi un 
quart-d'heure.. .Vous etes etonne de cela, lui repond sa 
femme, vous ne le connoissez done pas ? II est devors 
d'envie ; il enrage quand il paroit quelque chose de beau 
qui n'est pas de lui. On lui verra faire un jour quelques 
grands forfaits plutot que de se laisser ignorer. Tenez, je 
ne jurerois pas qu'il nese'rangeat du parti des Jesuites, et 
qu'il n'enterprit leur apologie.' — III. pp. 60, 61. 

The horror which Diderot ultimately conceived for 
him, is strongly expressed in the following letter to 
Grimm — written after an interview which compelled 
him, with many pangs, to renounce all intercourse 
with a man who had, for years^ been the object of his 
tenderest and most partial feelings. 

« Cet homme est un forcen£. Je l'ai vu, je lui ai re- 
proche avec toute la force que donne l'honnetete et une 
sorte d'interet qui reste au fond du cceur d'un ami qui lui 
est devoue depuis long-temps, l'enormite de sa conduite ; 
les pleurs versus aux pieds de madame d'Epinay, dans le 
moment meme ou il la chargeoit pres de moi des accusations 
les plus graves ; cette odieuse apologie qu'il vous a en- 
voyee, et ou il n'y pas une seule, des'raisons qu'il avoit a 
dire ; cette lettre projectee pour Saint-Lambert, qui devoit 
le tranquilliser sur des sentimens qu'il se reprochoit, et ou, 
loin d'avouer une passion nee dans son cceur malgre lui, il 



MADAME D'EPINAY. 



217 



6'excuse d'avoir, alarms Madame d'Houdetot sur la sienne. 
Que sais-je encore ? Je ne suis point content de ses res- 
ponses ; je n'ai pas eu le courage de le lui temigner j'ai 
mieux aime lui laisser la miserable consolation de croire 
qu'il m'a trompe. Qu'il vive ! II a mis dans sa defense un 
importement, froid qui m'a afflige. J'ai peur qu'il ne soit 
endurci. 

« Adieu, mon ami ; soyons et continuohs d'etre honne- 
tes gens : l'etat de ceux qui ont cesse de l'etre me fait peur. 

Adieu, mon ami ; je vous embrasse bien tendrement 

Je ne jette dans vos bras comme un homme effraye ; je ta- 
cbe en vain de faire de la poesie, mais cet homme me revi- 
ent tout a travers mon travail ; il me trouble, et je suis 
comme si j'avois a cote de moi un damne ; il est damne, 

cela est sur. Adieu mon ami Grimm, voila Pellet 

que je ferois sur vous, si je devenois jamais un mediant : 
en verite, j'aimerois mieux etre mort. II n'y a peut-etre 
pas le sens commun dans tout ce que je vous ecris, mais je 
vous avoue que je n'ai jamois eprouve un trouble d'ame si 
terrible que celu que j'ai. 

i < >h ! mon ami, quel spectacle que celui d'un homme 
mechant et bourrele ! Brdlez, dechirez ce papier, qu'il ne 
retombe plus sous vos yeux ; que je ne revoie plus cet hom- 
me la, il me feroit croire aux diables et a l'enfer. Si je 
suis jamais force de retourner chez lui, je suis sur que je 
fremiraitout lelong du chemin : j'avois la fievre en reve- 
nant. Je suis fache de ne lui avoir pas laisse voir Phorreur 
qu'il m'inspiroit, et je ne me reconcilie avec moi qu'en 
pensant, que vous, avectoute voire fermete, vous ne Pau- 
riez pas pu a ma place ; je ne sais pas pas s'il ne m'auroit 
pas me. On entendoit ses cris jusqu'au bout du jardin ; et 
jelevoyois! Adieu, mon ami, j'irai demain vous voir; 
j'irai chercher un homme de bien, aupres duquel je m'as- 
seye, qui me rassure, et qui chasse de mon ame je ne sais 
quoi d'infernal qui la tourmente et qui s'y est attache. Les 
poetes on bien fait de mettre un intervalle immense entre 
le ciel et les enfer. En verite, la main me tremble.' — III. 
pp. 148, 149. 

Madame d'Epinay lived, as we before observed, 
with many persons of great celebrity. We could not 
help smiling, among many others, at this anecdote of 
our countryman. David Hume. At the beginning of 
his splendid career of fame and fashion at Paris, the 
historian was persuaded to appear in the character of 
a sultan ; and was placed on a sofa between two of 
the most beautiful women of Paris, who acted for that 
evening the part of inexorables, whose favour he was 
supposed to be soliciting. The absurdity of this scene 
can easily be conceived. 

'Le celebre David Hume, grand et gros historiographe 
d'Angleterre, connu et estime par ses ecrits, n'a pas autant 
de talens pour ce genre d'amusemens auquel toures nos 
jolies femmes l'avoient decide propre. II fit son debut, 
chez Madame de T* * * ; on lui avoit destine le role d'un 
sultan assis entre deux esclaves, employant toute son elo- 
quence pour s'en faire aimer ; les trouvant inexorables, il 
devoit chercher le sujet de leurs peines et de leur resist- 
ance : on le place sur un sopha entre les deux plus jolies 
femmes de Paris, il les regarde attentivement, il se frappe 
le ventre et les genoux a plusieurs reprises, et ne trouve 
jamais autre chose a leur dire que : Eh bien '. mes demoi- 
selles. . . . Eh bien ! vous voila done. . . . Eh bien I 
vous voila. . . . vous voila ici 7 . . . . Cette phrase 
dura un quart d'heure, sans qu'il put en sortir. Une d'elles 
se leva d'impatience : Ah • dit-elle, je m'en etois bien dou- 
tee, cet homme n'est bon qu'a manger du veau ! Depuis ce 
temps il est relegue au role de spectateur, et n'en est pas 
moms fete et cajole. C'est en verite une chose plaisante 
que le role qu'il joue ici ; malheureusement pour lui, ou 
plutot pour la dignite philosophique, car, pour lui, il paroit 
s'accommoder fort de ce train de vie ; il n'y avoit aucune 
manie dominante dans ce pays lorsqu'il y est arrive ; on Pa 
regarde comme une trouvaille dans cette circonstance, et 
l'effervesence de nos jeunestetes s'est tournee de son cote. 
Toutes les jolies femmes s'en sont emparees ; il est de tous 
les soupers fins, et il n'est point de bonne fete sans lui : en 
un mot, il est pour nos agreables ce que les Genevois sont 
pour moi.'— III. pp. 284, 285. 

There is always some man, of whom the human 
viscera stand in greater dread than of any other per- 
son, who is supposed, for the time being, to be the 
only person who can dart his pill into their inmost re- 
cesses , and bind them over, in medical recognizance, 
to assimilate and digest. In the Trojan war, Podali- 
rius and Machaon were what Dr. Baillie and Sir Henry 
Halford now are — they had the fashionable practice of 
the Greek camp ; and, in all probability, received ma- 
ny a guinea from Agamemnon dear to Jove, and Nes- 
tor the tamer of horses. In the time of Madame 



d'Epinay, Dr. Tronchin, of Geneva, was in vogue, and 
no lady of fashion could recover without writing to 
him, or seeing him in person. To the Esculapius of 
this very small and irritable republic, Madame d'Epi- 
nay repaired ; and, after a struggle between life and 
death, and Dr. Tronchin, recovered her health. Dur- 
ing her residence at Geneva, she became acquainted 
with Voltaire, of whom she has left the following ad- 
mirable and original account — the truth, talent, and 
simplicity of which, are not a little enhanced by the 
tone of adulation or abuse which has been so generally 
employed in speaking of this celebrated person. 

' Eh bien ! mon ami, je n'aimerois pas a vivre de suite avec 
lui ; il n'a mil principe arrete, il compte trop sur sa memoire, 
et il en abuse souvent ; je trouve qu'elle fait trot quelquefois 
a sa conversation ; il redit plus qu'il ne dit, et ne laisse jamais 
rien a faire aux autres. II ne sait point causer, et il humilie 
l'amour-propre ; il dit le pour et le contre, tant qu'on veut, 
toujours avec de nouvelles graces a la verite, et neanmoius il 
a toujours fair de se moquer de tout, jusqu'a lui-meme. II n'a 
nulle philosophic dans la t£te ; il est tout herisse de petits 
preju£s d'enfans ; on les lui passeroit peut-etre en faveur de ses 
graces, du brillant de son esprit et de son originulite, s'il ne 
s'affichoit pas pour les sacouer tous. II a des inconsequences 
plaisantes, et il est au milieu de tout cela tres-amusaut a voir. 
Mais je n'aime point les gens qui ne font que m'amuser. Pour 
madame sa niece, elle est tout-a-fait comique. 

' II paroit ici depuis quelques jours un livre qui a vivernent 
echauffe les tetes, et qui cause des discussions fort interessan- 
tes entre differentes personnes de ce pays, parce que Ton pre- 
tend que la constitution de leur gouvernment y est interessee : 
Voltaire s'y trouve mele pour des propos assez vifs qu'il a tenu 
a ce sujet contre les pretres. La grosse niece trouve fort 
mauvais que tous les magistrats n'ayent pas pris fait et cause 
pour son oncle. Elle jette tour a tour ses grosses mains et ses 
petits bras par dessus sa tete, maudissant avec des cris inhu- 
mains les lois, les republiques, et surtout ces polissons de re- 
publicans qui vont a pied, qui sont obliges de souftrir les cri- 
ailleries de leurs pretres, etqui se croient libres. Cela est tout- 
a-fait bon a entendre et a voir.' — III. pp. 196, 197. 

Madame d'Epinay was certainly a woman of very 
considerable talent. *Rousseau accuses her of writing 
bad plays and romances. This may be ; but her epis- 
tolary style is excellent — her remarks on passing events 
lively, acute, and solid — and her delineation of char- 
acter admirable. As a proof this, we shall give her 
portrait of the Marquis de Croismare, one of the friends 
of Diderot and the Baron d'Holbach. 

' Je lui crois soixante ans ; il ne les paroit pourtant pas. II 
est d'une taille mediocre, sa figure a du etre tres-agreablc : 
elle se distingue encore par un air de noblesse et d'aisance. qui 
repand de la grace sur tout sa personne. Sa physionomie a 
de la finesse. Ses gestes, ses attitudes ne sont jamais recher- 
ches ; mais ils sont si bien d'accord avec la tournue de son ( s- 
prit, qu'ils semblent ajouter a son originalite. II parle des 
choses les plus serieuses et les plus importantes d'un ton si gai, 
qu'on est souvent tente de r>e rien croire de ce qu'il dit. On 
n'a presque jamais rien a citer de ce qu'on lui entend dire ; 
mais lorsqu'il parle, on ne veut rien perdre de ce qu'il dit ; s'il 
se tait, on desire qu'l parle encore. Sa prodigieuse vivacite, 
et une singuliere aptitude a toutes sortes ae talens et de con- 
noissances, l'ont porte a tout voir et a tout connoitre ; au mo- 
yen de quoi vous comprenez qu'il est fort instruit. II a bien 
lu, bien vu, et n'a retenu que ce qui valoit la peine de l'etre. 
Son esprit annonce d'abord plus d'agrement que de solidite, 
mais je crois que quiconque le jugeroit frivole lui feroit trot. 
Je le soupconne de renfermer dans son cabinet les epines des 
roses qu'il distribue dans la societe : assez constannnent gai 
dans le monde, seul je. le crois melancolique. On dit qu'il a 
l'ame aussi tendre qu'honnete ; qu'il sent vivement et qu'il se 
livre avec impetuosite a ce qui trouvre le chemin de son ccEur. 
Tout le monde ne lui plait pas ; il faut pour cela de l'original- 
ite, ou des vertus distinguees, ou de certains vices qu'il appelle 
passions ; neanmoins dans le courant de la vie, il s'accommode 
de tout. Beaucoup de curiosite et de la facilite dans le carac- 
tere (ce qui va jusqu'a la foiblesse) l'entrainent souvent a 
negliger ses meilleurs amis et a less perdre de vue, pour se 
livrer a des gouts factices et passagers : il en rit avec eux ; 
mais on voit si clairement qu'il en rougit avec lui-meme, qu'on 
ne peut lui savoir mauvais gre de ses disparates.'— III. pp. 324 
—326. 

The portrait of Grimm, the French Boswell, vol. iii. 
p. 97, is equally good, if not superior; but we have al- 
ready extracted enough to show the nature of the 
work, and the talents of the author. It is a lively 
entertaining book,— relating in an agreeable manner 
the opinions and habits of many remarkable men—- 



218 



vVORKS OF THE REV. SIDNEY SMITH. 



mingled with some very scandalous and improper pas- 
sages, which degrade the Avhole work. But if all the 
decencies and delicacies of life were in one scale, and 
five francs in the other, what French bookseller would 
feel a single moment of doubt in making his selec- 
tion? 



POOR LAWS. (Edinburgh Review, 1S21.) 

1. Safe Method for rendering Income arising from Personal 
Property available to the Poor-Laws. Longman & Co. 
1319. 

2. Summary Review of the Report and Evidence relative to 
the Poor-Laws. By S. W. Nicol. York. 

3. Essay on the Practicability of modifying the Poor-Laws. 
Sherwood. 1819. 

4. Considerations on the Poor-Laws. By John Davison, A.M. 
Oxford. 

Our readers, we fear, will require some apology for 
being asked to look at anything upon the poor-laws. 
No subject, we admit, can be more disagreeable, or 
more trite. But, unfortunately, it is tbe most impor- 
tant subject which the distressed state of the country 
is now crowding upon our notice. 

A pamphlet on the poor-laws generally contains 
some little piece of favourite nonsense, by which we 
are gravely told this enormous evil may be perfectly 
cured. The first gentleman recommends little gar- 
dens ; the second cows ; the third a village shop ; the 
fourth a spade ; the fifth Dr. Bell, and so forth. Eve- 
ry man rushes to the press with his small morsel of 
imbecility ; and is not easy till he sees his imperti- 
nence stitched in blue covers. In this list of absurdi- 
ties, we must not forget the project of supporting the 
poor from national funds, or, in other words, of im- 
mediately doubling the expenditure, and introducing 
every possible abuse into the administration of it. 

Then there are worthy men, who call upon gentle- 
men of fortune and education to become overseers — 
meaning, we suppose, that the present overseers are 
to perform the higher duties of men of fortune. Then 
merit is up as the test of relief; and their worships 
are to enter into a long examination of the life and 
character of each applicant, assisted, as they doubt- 
less would be, by candid overseers, and neighbours 
divested of every feeling of malice and partiality. 
The children are next to be taken from their parents, 
and lodged in immense pedagogueries of several acres 
each, where they are to be carefully secluded from 
those fathers and mothers they are commanded to 
jbey and honour, and are to be brought up in virtue 
oy the church wardens. — And this is grauely intended 
as a corrective of the poor-laws ; as if (to pass over 
the many other objections which might be made to it,) 
it would not set mankind populating faster than car- 
penters and bricklayers could cover in their children, 
or separate twigs to be bound into rods for their fla- 
gellation. An extension of the poor-laws to personal 
property is also talked of. We shall be very glad to 
see any species of property exempted from these laws, 
but have no wish that any which is now exempted 
should \,», subjected to their influence. The case 
would infallibly be like that of the income tax — the 
more easily the tax was raised the more profligate 
would be the expenditure. It is proposed also that 
alehouses should be diminished, and that the children 
of the poor should be catechized publicly in the church, 
both very respectable and proper suggestions, but of 
themselves hardly strong enough for the evil. We 
have every wish that the poor should accustom them- 
selves to habits of sobriety ; but we cannot help re- 
flecting, sometimes, that an alehouse is the only place 
where a poor tired creature, haunted with every spe- 
cies of wretchedness, can purchase three or four times 
a year three pennyworth of ale — a liquor upon which 
wine-drinking moralists are always extremely severe. 
We must not forget, among other nostrums, the eulogy 
of small farms — in other words, of small capital, and 
profound ignorance in the arts of agriculture ; and the 
evil is also thought to be curable by periodical con- 
tributions from men who have nothing, and can earn 
nothing without charity. To one of these plans, and 
perhaps the most plausible, Mr. Nicol has stated in 



the following passage, objections that are applicable 
to almost all the rest. 

• The district school would no doubt be well superintended 
and well regulated , magistrates and country gentlemen would 
be its visitors. The more excellent the establishment, the 
greater the mischief; because the greater the expense. We 
may talk what we will of economy, but where the care of the 
poor is taken exclusively into the hands of the rich, compara- 
tive extravagance is the necessary consequence : to say that 
the gentleman, or even the overseer, would never permit the 
poor to live at the district school, as they live at home, is say- 
ing far too Httle. English humanity will never see the poor in 
any thing like want, when that want is palpably and visibly 
brought before it : first, it will give necessaries, next comforts ; 
until its fostering care rather pampers, than merely relieves. 
The humanity itself is highly laudable ; but if practised on an 
extensive scale, its consequences must entail an almost unlim- 
ited expenditure. 

'Mr. Locke computes that the labour of a child from 3 to 14, 
being set against its nourishment and teaching, the result 
would be exoneration of the parish from expense. Nothing 
could prove more decisively the incompetency of the board of 
trade to advise on this question. Of the productive labour of 
the workhouse, I shall have to speak hereafter ; I will only ob- 
serve in this place, that after the greatest care and attention 
bestowed on the subject, after expensive looms purchased, &c, 
the 50 boys of the blue coat school earned in the year 1816, 5<M. 
10s. 3d. ; the 40 girls earned, in the same time, 40/. 7s. Od. The 
ages of these children are from 8 to 16. They earn about one 
pound in the year, and cost about twenty. 

' The greater the call for labour in public institutions, be 
they prisons, workhouses, or schools, the more difficult to be 
procured that labour must be. There will thence be both mutch 
less of it for the comparative numbers, and it will afford a 
much less price ; to get any labour at all, one school must un- 
derbid another. 

'It has just been observed, that "the child of a poor cotta- 
ger, half clothed, half fed, with the enjoyment of home and 
liberty, is not only happier but better than the little automa- 
ton of a parish workhouse :" and this I believe is accurately 
true. I scarcely know a more cheering sight, though certainly 
many more elegant ones, than the youthful gambols of a village 
green. They call to mind the description given by Paley of 
the shoals of the fry of fish : " They are so happy that they 
know not what to do with themselves ; their attitude, their vi- 
vacity, their leaps out of the water, their frolics in it, all con- 
duce to show their excess of spirits, and are simply the effects 
of that excess." 

'Though politeness may be banished from the cottage, and 
though the anxious mother may sometimes chide a little too 
sharply, yet here both maternal endearments and social affec 
tion exist in perhaps their greatest vigour : the attachments 
of lower life, where independent of attachment there is so little 
to enjoy, far outstrip the divided if not exhausted sensibility 
of the rich and great ; and in depriving the poor of these at 
tachments, we may be said to rob them of their little all. 

' But it is not to happiness only I here refer : it is to morals 
I listen with great reserve to that system of moral instruction, 
which has not social affection for its basis, or the feelings of 
the heart for its ally. It is not to be concealed, that every 
thing may be taught, yet nothing learned, that systems plan- 
ned with care, and executed with attention, may evaporate 
into unmeaning forms, where the imagination is not roused, or 
the sensibility impressed. 

'Let us suppose the children of the "district school," nur- 
tured with that superabundant care which such institutions, 
when supposed to be well conducted, are wont to exhibit; 
they rise with the dawn ; after attending to the calls of clean- 
liness, prayers follow; then a lesson; then breakfast; then 
work, till noon liberates them, for perhaps an hour, from the 
walls of their prison to the walls of their prison court. Din- 
ner follows ; and then, in course, work, lessons, supper, 
prayers ; at length, after a day dreary and dull, the counter- 
part of every day which has preceded, and of all that are to 
follow, the children are dismissed to bed. — This system may 
construct a machine, but it will not form a man. Of what does 
it consist ? of prayers parroted without one sentiment in ac- 
cord with the words uttered: of moral lectures which the un- 
derstanding does not comprehend, or the heart feel ; of end- 
less bodily constraint, intolerable to youthful vivacity, and in- 
jurious to the perfection of the human frame. — The cottage 
day may not present so imposing a scene ; no decent uniform ; 
no well trimmed locks ; no glossy skin ; no united response of 
hundreds of conjoined voices; no lengthened procession, mis- 
named exercise ; but if it has less to strike the eye, it has far 
more to engage the heart. A trifle- in the way of cleanliness 
must suffice; the prayer is not forgot; it is perhaps imper- 
fectly repeated, and confusedly understood ; but it is not mut- 
tered as a vain sound ; it is an earthly parent that tells of a 
heavenly one ; duty, love, obedience, are not words without 
meaning, when repeated by a mother to a child : to God, the 
great unknown Being that made all things, all thanks, all 
praise, all adoration is due. The young religionist may be in 



POOR-LAWS. 



*19' 



some measure bewildered by all this ; his notions may be ob- 
scure, but his feelings will be roused, and the foundation at 
least of true piety will be laid. 

1 Of moral instruction, the child may be taught less at home 
than at school, but he will be taught better ; that is, whatever 
he is taught he will feel ; he will not have abstract proposi- 
tions of duty coldly presented to his mind; but precept and 
practice will be conjoined ; what he is told it is right to do will 
be instantly done. Sometimes the operative principle on the 
child's mind will be love, sometimes fear, sometimes habitual 
sense of obedience; it is always something that will impress, 
always something that will be remembered. 

There are two points which we consider as now admit- 
ted by all men of sense — 1st, That the poor-laws must 
be abolished ; 2dly, That they must be very gradually 
abolished.* We hardly think it worth while to throw 
away pen and ink upon any one who is still inclined 
to dispute either of these propositions.' 

With respect to the gradual abolition, it must be 
observed, that the present redundant population of the 
country has been entirely produced by the poor-laws : 
and nothing could be so grossly unjust as to encourage 
people to such a vicious multiplication, and then, 
when you happen to discover your folly, immediately 
i o starve them into annihilation. You have been call- 
ing^Upon your population for two hundred years to beget 
more children — furnished them with clothes, food, and 
houses — taught them to lay up nothing for matrimony, 
nothing for children, nothing for age — but to depend 
upon justices of the peace for every human want. The 
folly is now detected ; but the people, who are the 
fruit of it, remain. It was madness to call them in 
this manner into existence ; but it would be the height 
of cold-blooded cruelty to get rid of them by any other 
than the most gentle and gradual means ; and not only 
would it be cruel, but extremely dangerous to make 
the attempt. Insurrections of the most sanguinary 
and ferocious nature would be the immediate conse- 
quence of any very sudden change in the system of the 
poor-laws ; not partial, like those which proceeded 
from an impeded or decaying state of manufactures, 
but as universal as the poor-laws themselves, and as 
ferocious as insurrections always are which are led on 
by hunger and despair. 

These observatione may serve as an answer to those 
angry and impatient gentlemen, who are always cry- 
ing out, What have the House of Commons done ? — 
What have they to show for their labours ? Are the 
rates lessened ? Are the evils removed ? The com- 
mittee of the House of Commons would have shown 
themselves to be a set of the most contemptible char- 
latans, if they had proceeded with any such indecent 
and perilous haste, or paid the slightest regard to the 
ignorant folly which required it at their hands. They 
have very properly begun, by collecting all possible 
information upon the subject ; by consulting specula- 
tive and practical men ; by leaving time for the press 
to contribute whatever it could of thought or know- 
Ledge on the subject ; and by introducing measures, 
the effects of which will be, and are intended to be, 
gradual. The lords seemed at first to have been sur- 
prised that the poor-laws were not abolished before 
the end of the first session of Parliament ; and accord- 
ingly set up a little rival committee of their own, 
which did little or nothing, and will not, we believe be 
renewed. We are so much less sanguine than those 
noble legislators, that we shall think the improvement 
immense, and a subject of very general congratulation, 
if the poor-rates are perceptibly diminished, and if 
the system of pauperism is clearly going down in 
twenty or thirty years hence. 

We think, upon the whole, that govenment has been 
fortunate in the selection of the gentleman who is 
placed at the head of the committee for the revision of 
the poor-laws ; or rather, we should say (for he is a 

* I am not quite so wrong in this as I seem to be, nor after 
all our experience am I satisfied that there has not been a good 
deal of rashness and precipitation in the conduct of this admir- 
able, measure. You have not been able to carry the law into 
.manufacturing countries. Parliament will compel you to 
lUoftan some of the more severe clauses. It has been the nu- 
icleus of general insurrection and chartism. The Duke of 
Wellington wisely recommended that the experiment should 
ilbc first tried in a few counties round the metropolis. 



gentleman of very independent fortune), who has con- 
sented that he should be placed there. Mr. Sturges 
Bourne is undoubtedly a man of business, and of very 
good sense : he has made some mistakes ; but, upon 
the whole, sees the subject as a philosopher and a 
statesman ought to do. Above all, we are pleased 
with his good nature and good sense in adhering to his 
undertaking, after the Parliament has flung out two or 
three or his favourite bills. Many men would have 
surrendered so unthankful and laborious an under- 
taking in disgust ; but Mr. Bourne knows better what 
appertains to his honour and character, and above all 
what he owes to his country. It is a great subject ; 
and such as will secure to him the gratitude and fa- 
vour of posterity, if he brings it to a successful 
issue. 

We have stated our opinion, that all remedies, with 
out gradual abolition, are of little importance. With 
a foundation laid for gradual abolition, every auxiliary 
improvement of the poor-laws (while they do remain) 
is worthy the attention of Parliament ; and in sugges- 
ting a few alteratious as fit to be immediately adopted, 
we wish it to be understood, that we nave m view the 
gradual destruction of the system, as well as its amend- 
ment while it continues to operate. 

It seems to us, then, that one of the first and great- 
est improvements of this unhappy system would be a 
complete revision of the law of settlement. Since Mr. 
East's act for preventing the removal of the poor till 
they are actually chargeable, any man may live where 
he pleases, till he becomes a beggar, and asks alms of 
the place where he resides. To gam a settlement, 
then, is nothing more than to gain a right of begging : 
it is not, as it used to be before Mr. East's act, a pow- 
er of residing where, in the judgment of the resident, 
his industry and exertion will be best rewarded ; but a 
power of taxing the industry and exertions of other 
persons in the place where his settlement falls. This 
privilege produces all the evil complained of in the 
poor-laws ; and instead, therefore, of being conferred 
with the liberality and profusion which it is at present, 
it should be made of very difficult attainment, and lia- 
ble to the fewest possible changes. The constant 
policy of our courts of justice has been, to make set- 
tlements easily obtained. Since the period we have 
before alluded to, this has certainly been a very mista- 
ken policy. It would be a far wiser course to abolish 
all other means of settlement than those of birth, pa- 
rentage, and marriage — not for the limited reason 
stated in the committee, that it would diminish the 
law expenses (though that, too, is of importance), but 
because it would invest fewer residents with the fatal 
privilege of turning beggars, exempt a greater number 
of labourers from the moral corruption of the poor- 
laws, and stimulate them to exertion and economy, by 
the fear of removal if they are extravagant and idle. 
Of ten men who leave the place of their birth, four, 
probably, get a settlement by yearly hiring, and four 
others by renting a small tenement ; while two or 
three may return to the place of their nativity, and 
settle there. Now, under the present system, here are 
eight men settled where they have a right to beg 
without being removed. The probability is, that they 
will all beg ; and that their virtue will give way to the 
incessant temptation of the poor-laws : but if these 
men had felt from the very beginning, that removal 
from the place where they wished most to live would 
be the sure consequence of their idleness and extrava- 
gance, the probability is, that they would have escap- 
ed the contagion of pauperism, and been much more 
useful members of society than they now are. The 
best labourers in a village are commonly those who are 
living where they are legally settled, and have there- 
fore no right to ask charity — for the plain reason, that 
they have nothing to depend upon but their own exer- 
tions : in short, for them the poor-laws hardly exist ; 
and they are such as the great mass of English peas- 
antry would be, if we had escaped the curse of these 
laws altogether. 

It is incorrect to say, that no labourer would settle 
out of the place of his birth, if the means of acquiring 
a settlement were so limited. Many men begin the 
world with strong hope and much confidence in their 



220 



WORKS OF THE REV. SIDNEY SMITH. 



own fortune, and without any intention of subsisting 
by charity ; but they see others subsisting in greater 
ease, without their toil— and their spirit gradually 
sinks to the meanness of mendicity. 

An affecting picture is sometimes drawn of a man 
falling into want in the decline of life, and compelled 
to remove from the place where he has spent the 
greatest part of his days. These things are certainly 
painful enough to him who has the misfortune to wit- 
ness them. But they must be taken upon a large 
scale ; and the whole good and evil which they pro- 
duce diligently weighed and considered. The ques- 
tion then will be, Avhether any thing can be more 
really humane, than to restrain a system which relaxes 
the smews of industry, and places the dependence of 
laborious men upon anything but themselves. We 
must not think oidy of the wretched sufferer who is re- 
moved, and, at the sight of his misfortunes, call out for 
fresh facilities to beg. We must remember the in- 
dustry, the vigour, and the care Avhich the dread of 
removal has excited, and the number of persons who 
owe their happiness and their wealth to that salutary 
feeling. The very person who, in the decline of life, is 
removed from the spot where be has spent so great a 
part of his time, would, perhaps, have been a pauper 
half a century before, if he had been afflicted with the 
right of asking alms in the place where he lived. 

It has been objected, that this plan of abolishing all 
settlements but those of birth, would send a man, the 
labour of whose youth had benefited some other par- 
ish, to pass the useless part of his life in a place for 
which he existed only as a burden. Supposing that 
this were the case, it would be quite sufficient to an- 
swer, that any given parish would probably send 
away as many useless old men as it received : and, 
after all, little inequalities must be borne for the gen- 
eral good. But, in truth, it is rather ridiculous to talk 
of a parish not having benefited by the labour of the 
man who is returned upon their hands in his old age. 
If such parish resembles most of those in England, the 
absence of a man for thirty or forty years has been a 
great good instead of an evil;, they have had many 
more labourers than they could employ ; and the very 
man whom they are complaining of supporting for his 
few last years, would, in all probability, have been a 
beggar forty* years betore, if he had remained among 
them ; or, by pushing him out of work, would have 
made some other man a beggar. Are the benefits de- 
rived from prosperous manufactures limited to the 
parishes which contain them ? The industry of Hali- 
fax, Huddersfield, or Leeds, is felt across the kingdom 
as far as the Eastern Sea. The prices of meat and 
corn at the markets of York and Malton are instantly 
affected by any increase of demand and rise of wages 
in the manufacturing districts to the west. They have 
benefited these distant places, and found labour for 
their superfluous hands by the prosperity of their man- 
ufactures. Where, then, would be the injustice, if 
the manufacturers, in the time of stagnation and pov- 
erty, were returned to their birth settlements ? But as 
the law now stands, population tumors, of the most 
dangerous nature, may spring up in any parish: — a 
manufacturer, concealing his intentiou, may settle 
there, take 200 or 300 apprentices, fail, and half ruin 
the parish which has been the scene of his operations. 
For these reasons, we strongly recommend to Mr. 
Bourne to narrow as much as possible, in all his future 
bills, the means of acquiring settlements,* and to re- 
duce them ultimately to parentage, birth, and marriage 
— convinced that, by so doing, he will, in furtherance 
of the great object of abolishing the poor-laws, be only 
limiting the right of begging, and preventing the resi- 
dent aud almsman from being (as they now common- 
ly are) one and the same person. But, before we dis- 
miss this part of the subject, we must say a few words 
upon the methods by which settlements are now gain- 
In the settlement by hiring it is held, that a man has 
a claim upon the parish for support where he has la- 
boured for a year ; and yet another, who has laboured 
there for twenty years by short hirings, gains no set- 

* This has been done. 



] tlement at all. When a man was not allowed to live 
where he was not settled, it was wise to lay hold of 

I any plan for extending settlements. But the whole 
question is now completely changed ; and the only 
point which remains is, to fiud out what mode of con- 
ferring settlements produces the least possible mis- 
chief. We are convinced it is by throwing every pos- 
sible difficulty in the way of acquiring them. If a set- 
tlement hereafter should not be obtained in that par- 
ish in which labourers have worked for many years, 
it will be because it contributes materially to their 
happiness that they should not gain a settlement 
there ; and this is a full answer to the apparent injus- 
tice. 

Then, upon what plea of common sense should a 
man gain a power of taxing a parish to keep him, be- 
cause he has rented a tenement of ten pounds a year 
there? or, because he has served the office of clerk, 
or sexton, or hog-ringer, or bought an estate of thirty 
pounds value ? However good these various pleas 
might be for conferring settlements, if it was desira- 
ble to increase the facility of obtaining them, they arc- 
totally inefficacious if it can be shown that the means 
of gaining new settlements should be confined to the 
limits of the strictest necessity. 

These observations (if they have the honour of at- 
tracting his attention) will show Mr. Bourne our opin- 
ion of his bill for giving the privilege ot settlement 
only to a certain length of residence. In the first 
place, such a bill would be the cause of endless vexa- 
tion to the poor, from the certainty of their being 
turned out of their cottages, before they pushed their 
legal taproot into the parish ; and, secondly, it would 
rapidly extend all the evils of the poor laws, by iden- 
tifying, much more than they are at present identifi- 
ed, the resident and the settled man — the very oppos- 
ite of the policy which ought to be pursued. 

Let us suppose, then, that we have got rid of all the 
means of gaining a settlement, or right to become a 
beggar, except by birth, parentage, and marriage ; for 
the wife, of course, must fall into the settlement of 
the husband ; and the children, till emancipated, must 
be removed, if their parents are removed. This point 
gained, the task of regulating the law expenses of the 
poor-laws would be nearly accomplished : for the 
most fertile causes of dispute would be removed. Ev- 
ery first settlement is an inexhaustible source of litiga- 
tion and expense to the miserable rustics. Upon the 
simple fact, for example, of a farmer hiring a plough- 
man for a year, arise the following afflicting questions : 
— Wa6 it an expressed contract ? Was it an implied 
contract ? Was it an implied hiring of the plough- 
man, rebutted by circumstances? Was the plough- 
man's contracti'or a year's prospective service i Was 
it a customary hiring of the ploughman ? Was it a re- • 
trospective hiring ot the ploughman ? Was it a con- ■ 
ditional hiring ? Was it a general hiring ? Was it a 
special, or a special yearly hiring, or a special hiring 
with wages reserved weekly ? Did the farmer make 
it a special conditional hiring with warning, or an ex- 
ceptive hiring ? Was the service of the ploughman 
actual or constructive ? Was there any dispensation 
expressed or implied? — or was there a dissolution im- 
plied? — by new agreement ? — or mutual consent ? — or 
by justices ? — or by any other of the ten thousand I 
means which the ingenuity of lawyers has created '.' ! 
Can any one be surprised, after this, that the amount' 
of appeals for removals, iii the four quarter session.-:; 
ending Mid-summer, 1817, were four thousand seven: 
hundred ?* Can any man doubt that it is necessary to 
reduce the hydra to as few heads as possible ? or can 
any other objection be stated to such reduction, than 
the number of attorneys and provincial counsel, whom 
it will bring into the poor-house ? Mr. Nicol says, 
that the greater number of modes of settlement do not 
increase litigation. He may just as well say, that the 
number of streets in the Seven Dials does not increase 
the difficulty of finding the way. The modes of set- 
tlement we leave, are by far the simplest, and the ev- 
idence is assisted by registers. 
Under the head of law expenses, we are convinced 

* Commons' Report, 1817. 



POOR-LAWS. 



221 



a great deal may be done, by making some slight al- 
teration in the law of removals. At present, removals 
are made without any warning to the parties to whom 
the pauper is removed ; and the first intimation which 
the defendant parish receives of the projected in- 
crease of their population is, by the arrival of the 
father, mother, and eight or nine children at the over- 
seer's door — where they are tumbled out, with the 
justice's order about their necks, and left as a specta- 
cle to the assembled and indignant parishioners. No 
sooner have the poor wretches become a little famili- 
arized to their new parish, than the order is appealed 
against, and they are recarted with the same precipi- 
tate indecency — Quo fata trahunt. retrahuntque. 

No removal should ever take place without due no- 
tice to the parish to which the pauper is to be remov- 
ed, nor till the time in which it may be appealed 
against is passed by. Notice to be according to the 
distance — either by letter, or personally ; and the de- 
cision should be made by the justices at their petty 
sessions, with as much care and attention as if there 
were no appeal from their decision. An absurd no- 
tion prevails among magistrates, that they need not 
take much trouble in the investigation of removals, 
because their errors may be corrected by a superior 
court ; whereas, it is an object of great importance, 
by a fair and diligent investigation in the nearest and 
cheapest court, to convince the country people which 
party is right and which is wrong : and in this man- 
ner to prevent them from becoming the prey of law 
vermin. We are convinced that this subject of the 
removal of poor is well worthy a short and separate 
bill. Mr. Bourne thinks it would be very difficult to 
draw up such a bill. We are quite satisfied we could 
draw up one in ten minutes that would completely 
auswer the end proposed, and cure the evil complain- 
ed of. 

We proceed to a number of small details, which are 
well worth the attention of the legislature. Over- 
seers' accouuts should be given hi quarterly, and pass- 
ed by the justices, as they now are, annually. The 
office of overseer should be triennial. The accounts 
which have nothing to do with the poor, such as the 
constable's account, should be kept and passed sepa- 
rately from them; and the vestry should have the 
power of ordering a certain portion of the superfluous 
poor upon the roads. But we beseech all speculators 
in poor-laws to remember, that the machinery they 
must work with is of a very coarse description. An 
overseer must always be a limited, uneducated per- 
son, but little interested in what he is about, and with 
much business of his own on his hands. The exten- 
sive interference of gentlemen with those matters is 
quite visionary and impossible. If gentlemen were 
tide-waiters, the custom-house would be better serv- 
ed; if gentlemen would become petty constables, the 
police would be improved; if bridges were made of 
gold, instead of iron, they would not rust. But there 
arc not enough of these articles for such purposes. 

A great part of the evils of the poor laws, has been 
Occasioned by the large powers intrusted to individual 
justices. Every body is full of humanity and good- 
nature when he can relieve misfortune by putting his 
hand — in his neighbour's pocket. Who can bear to 
;see a fellow-ereature suffering pain and poverty, when 
| he can. order other fellow-creatures to relieve him? 
lis it in human nature, that A shoidd see B in tears and 
i misery, and not order C to assist him? Such a power 
must, of course, be liable to every degree of abuse ; 
i and the sooner the power of ordering relief can be 
taken out of the hands of magistrates, the sooner shall 
we begin to experience some mitigation of the evils of 
i the poor-laws. The special-vestry bill is good for this 
(purpose, as far as it goes ; but it goes a very little 
i way ; and we much doubt if it will operate as any sort 
j of abridgment to the power of magistrates granting 
! relief. A single magistrate must not act under this 
bill but in cases of special emergency. But every case 
| of distress is a case of special emergency ; and the 
(double magistrates, holding their petty sessions at 
some little alehouse, and overwhelmed with all the 
) monthly business of the hundred, cannot possibly give 
to the pleadings of the overseer and pauper halfjths 



attention they would be able to afford them at their 
own houses. 

The common people have been so much accustomed 
to resort to magistrates for relief, that it is certainly a 
delicate business to wean them from this bad habit ; 
but it is essential to the great objects which the poor- 
committee have in view, that the power of magistrates 
of ordering relief should be gradually taken away. 
When this is once done, half the difficulties of the 
abolition are accomplished. We will suggest a few 
hints as to the means by which this desirable end 
may be promoted. 

A poor man now comes to a magistrate any day in 
the week, and any hour in the day, to complain of the 
overseers, or of the select committee. Suppose he 
were to be made to wait a little, and to feel for a short 
time the bitterness of that poverty which, by idleness, 
extravagance, and hasty marriage, he has probably 
brought upon himself. To effect this object, we 
would prohibit all orders for relief, by justices, be- 
tween the 1st and 10th day of the month ; and leave 
the poor entirely in the hands of the overseers, or of 
the select vestry, for that period. Here is a beginning 
— a gradual abolition of one of the first features of the 
poor-laws. And it is without risk of tumult ; for no 
one will run the risk of breaking the laws for an evil 
to which he anticipates so speedy a termination. This 
Decameron of overseers' despotism, and paupers' suf- 
fering, is the very thing wanted. It will teach the 
parishes to administer their own charity responsibly, 
and to depend upon their own judgment. It will teach 
the poor the miseries of pauperism and dependence ; 
and will be a warning to unmarried young men not 
hastily and rashly to place themselves, their wives and 
children, in the same miserable situation ; and it will 
effect all these objects gradually, and without danger. 
It would of course be the same thing on principle, if 
relief were confined to three days between the 1st and 
10th of each month ; three between the 10th and 20th ; 
three between the 20th and the end of the month ; — or 
in any other manner that would gradually* crumble 
away the power, and check the gratuitous munificence 
of justices, — give authority over their own affairs to 
the heads of the parish, and teach the poor, by little 
and little, that they must suffer if they are imprudent. 
It is understood in all these observations, that the 
overseers are bound to support their poor without any 
order of justices ; and that death arising from absolute 
want should expose those officers to very severe pun- 
ishments, if it could be traced to their inhumanity and 
neglect. The time must come when we must do with- 
out this ; but we are not got so far yet — aud are at 
present only getting rid of justices, not of overseers. 

Mr. Davison seems to think that the plea of old age 
stands upon a very different footing, with respect to 
the poor-laws, from all other pleas. But why should 
this plea be more favoured than that of sickness ? — 
why more than losses in trade, incurred by no impru- 
dence. Every man knows he is exposed to the help- 
lessness of age ; but sickness and sudden ruin are very 
often escaped — comparatively seldom happen. Why 
is a man exclusively to be protected against that evil 
which he must have foreseen longer than any other, 
and has had the longest time to guard against ? Mr. 
Davison's objections to a limited expenditure are much 
more satisfactory. These we shall lay before our 
readers ; and we recommend them to the attention of 
the committee. 

1 1 shall advert next to the plan of a limitation upon the 
amount of rates to be assessed in future. This limitation, as it 
is a pledge of some protection to the property now subjected 
to the maintenance of the poor against the indefinite encroach- 
ment which otherwise threatens it, is, in that light, certainly a 
benefit; and supposing it were rigorously adhered to, the very 
knowledge, among the parish expectants, that there was some 
limit to their range of expectation, some barrier which they 
could not pass, might incline them to turn their thoughts home- 
ward again to the care of themselves. But it is an expedient, 
at the best, far from being satisfactory. In the first place, 
there is much reason to fear that such a limitation would not 

* All gradation and caution have been banished since there- 
form bill— rapid high-pressure wisdom u the only agent ia 
' public affairs. 



WORKS OF THE REV. SIDNEY SMITH. 



eventually be maintained, after the example of a similar one 
having failed before, and considering that the urgency of the 
applicants as long as they retain the principle of dependence 
upon the parish unqualified in any one of its main articles, 
would probably overbear a mere barrier of figures in the par- 
ish account. Then there would be much real difficulty in the 
proceedings, to be governed by such a limiting rule. For the 
use of the limitation would be chiefly, or solely, incases where 
there is some struggle between the ordinary supplies of the 
parish rates, and the exigences of the poor, or a kind of run 
and pressure upon the parish by a mass of indigence : and in 
circumstances of this kind, it would be hard to know how to 
distribute the supplies under a fair proportion of the appli- 
cants known or expected ; hard to know how much might be 
granted for the present, and how much should be kept in re- 
serve for the remainder of the year's service. The real intri- 
cacy in such a distribution of account would show itself in dis- 
proportions and inequalities of allowance, impossible to be 
avoided ; and the applicants would have one pretext more for 
discontent. 

' The limitation itself in many places would be only in words 
and figures. It would be set, I presume, by an average of cer- 
tain preceding years. But the average taken upon the pre- 
ceding years might be a sum exceeding in its real value the 
highest amount of the assessments of any of the averaged 
years, under the great change which has taken place in the 
value of money itself. A given rate, or assessment nominally the 
same, or lower, might in this way be a greater real money value 
than it was some time before. In many of the most distressed 
districts, where the parochial rates have nearly equalled the 
rents, a nominal average would, therefore, be no effectual ben- 
efit; and yet it is in those districts that the alleviation of the 
burthen is the most wanted. 

' It is manifest, also, that a peremptory restriction of the 
whole amount of money applicable to the parochial service, 
though abundantly justified in many districts by their particu- 
lar condition being so impoverished as to make the measure, 
for them, almost a measure of necessity, if nothing can be sub- 
stituted for it ; and where the same extreme necessity does not 
exist, still justified by the prudence of preventing in some way 
the interminable increase of the parochial burthens; still, that 
such a restriction is an ill-adjusted measure in itself, and 
would, in many instances, operate very inequitably. It would 
fall unfairly in some parishes, where the relative state of the 
poor and the parish might render an increase of the relief as 
just and reasonable as it is possible for any thing to be under 
the poor-laws at all. It would deny to many possible fair 
claimants the whole, or a part, of that degree of relief com- 
monly granted elsewhere to persons in their condition, on this 
or that account of claim. Leaving the reason of the present 
demands wholly unimpeached, and unexplained ; directing no 
distinct warning or remonstrance to the parties, in the line of 
their affairs, by putting a check to their expectations upon po- 
sitive matters implicated in their conduct ; which would be 
speaking to them in a definite sense, and a sense applicable to 
all: this plan of limitation would nurture the whole mass of 
the claim in its origin, and deny the allowance of it to thou- 
sands, on account of reasons properly affecting a distant quar- 
ter, of which they knew nothing. The want of a clear me- 
thod, and of a good principle at the bottom of it, in this direct 
compulsory restriction, renders it, I think, wholly unaccept- 
able, unless it be the only possible plan that can be devised 
for accomplishing the same end. If a parish had to keep its 
account with a single dependent, the plan would be much more 
useful in that case. For the ascertained fact of the total 
amount of his expectations might set his mind at rest, and put 
him on a decided course of providing for himself. But, in the 
limitation proposed to be made, the ascertained fact is of a 
general amount only, not of each man's share in it. Conse- 
quently, each man has his indefinite expectations left to him, 
and every separate specific ground of expectation remaining 
as before.' 

Mr. Davison talks of the propriety of refusing to 
find labour for able labourers after the lapse of ten 
years, as if it was some ordinary bill he was propos- 
ing, unacompanied by the slightest risk. It is very easy 
to make such laws, aud to propose them ; but it would 
be of immense difficulty to carry them into execution. 
Done it must be, everybody knows that ; but the merit 
will consist in discovering the gradual and gentle means 
by which the difficulties of getting parish labour may 
be increased, and the life of a parish pauper be rend- 
ered a life of salutary and deterring hardship. A law 
that rendered such request for labour perfectly lawful 
for ten years longer, and then suddenly abolished it, 
would merely bespeak a certain, general, and violent 
insurrection for the year 1830. The legislator, thank 
God, is in his nature a more cunning and gradual ani-* 
mal. 

Before we drop Mr. Davison, who writes like a .very 
sensible man, we wish to say a few words about his 



style. If he would think less about it, he would write 
much better. It is always as plethoric and full- 
dressed as if he were writing a treatise definibusbono- 
rum et malorum. He is sometimes obscure ; and is 
occasionally apt to dress up common-sized thoughts in 
big clothes, and to dwell a little too long in proving 
what every man of sense knows and admits. We 
hope we shall not offend Mr. Davison by these re- 
marks ; and we have really no intention of doing so. 
His views upon the poor-laws are, generally speaking, 
very correct and philosophical ; he writes like a gen- 
tleman, a scholar, and a man capable of eloquence ; 
and we hope he will be a bishop. If his mitred pro- 
ductions are as enlightened and as liberal as this, we 
are sure he will confer as much honour on the bench 
as he receives from it. There is a good deal, however, 
in Mr. Davison's book about the ' virtuous marriage^ 
of the poor.' To have really the charge of a faniily 
as a husband and a father, we are told, — to have the 
privilege of laying out his life in their service, is the 
poor man's boast, — ' his home is the school of his sen- 
timents,' &c. &c. This is viewing human life through 
a Claude Lorraine glass, and decorating it with colours 
that do not belong to it. A ploughman marries a 
ploughwoman because she is plump ; generally uses 
her ill ; thinks his children an incumbrance ; very 
often flogs them ; and, for sentiment, has nothing 
more nearly approaching to it, than the ideas of 
broiled bacon and mashed potatoes. This is the state 
of the lower orders of mankind — deplorable, but true 
— and yet rendered much worse by the poor-laws. 

The system of roundsmen is much complained of r 
as well as that by which the labour of paupers is paid, 
partly by the rate, partly by the master ; and a long 
string of Sussex justices send up a petition on the sub- 
ject. But the evil we are suffering under is an excess 
of population. There are ten men applying for work, 
when five only are wanted; of course, such a redun- 
dance of labouring persons must depress the rate of 
their labour far beyond what is sufficient for the sup- 
port of their families. And how is that deficiency to 
be made up but from the parish rates, unless it is 
meant suddenly and immediately to abolish the whole 
system of the poor laws ? To state that the rate of 
labour is lower than a man can live by, is merely to 
state that we have had, and have, poor laws — of which, 
this practice is at length the inevitable consequence ; 
and nothing could he more absurd than to attempt to 
prevent, by acts of parliament, the natural deprecia- 
tion of an article which exists in much greater abun- 
dance than it is wanted. Nor can any thing be more 
unjust than the complaint, that roundsmen are paid 
by their employers at an inferior rate, and that the 
difference is made up by the parish funds. A rounds- 
man is commonly an inferior description of labourer 
who cannot get regularly hired ; he comes upon hisi 
parish for labour commonly at those seasons when' 
there is the least to do ; he is not a servant of the 
farmer's choice, and probably does not suit him : he 
goes off to any other labour at a moment's warning, 
when he finds it more profitable, and the farmer is 
forced to keep nearly the same number of labourers 
as if there were no roundsmen at all. Is it just, then 
that a labourer, combining every species of imperfec- 
tion, should receive the same wages as a chosen, regiHI 
lar, stationary person, who is always ready at hand'' 
and whom the farmer has selected for his dexterity 
and character ? 

Those persons who do not, and cannot employ la 
bourers,have no kind of right to complain of the third 
or fourth part of the wages being paid by the rates | 
for if the farmers did not agree among themselves U 
take such occasional labourers, the whole of theii 
support must be paid by the rates, instead of one-third 
The order is, that the pauper shall be paid such i 
sum as will support himself and family ; and if this 
agreement to take roundsmen was not entered into bj 
the farmers, they must be paid, by the rates, th< 
whole of the amount of the order, for doing nothing 
If a circulating labourer, therefore, with three chil 
dren, to whom the justices would order 12s. per weeki 
receives 8s. from his employer, and 4s. from the rates 
the parish is not burthened by this system to tht 



ANASTASIUS. 



223 



amount of 4s. but relieved to the amount of 8*. A 
parish manufacture, conducted by overseers, is infi- 
nitely more burdensome to the rates, than any system 
of roundsmen. There are undoubtedly a few instances 
to the contrary. Zeal and talents will cure the origi- 
nal defects of any system ; but to suppose that average 
men can do what extraordinary men have done is the 
cause of many silly projects and extravagant blunders. 
Mr. Owen may give his whole heart and soul to the 



improvement of one of his parochial parallelograms; 
but who is to succeed to Mr. Owen's enthusiasm ? 
Before we have quite done with the subject of rounds- 
men, we cannot help noticing a strange assertion of 
Mr. Nicol, that the low rate of wages paid by the 
master is an injustice to the pauper — that he is cheat- 
ed, forsooth, out of Si. or 10s. per week by this ar- 
rangement. Nothing, however, can possibly be more 
absurd than such an allegation. The whole country 
is open to him. Can he gain more anywhere else ? If 
not, this is the market price of his labour ; and what 
right has he to complain ( or how can he say he is 
defrauded ? A combination among farmers to lower 
the price of labour would be impossible, if labour did 
not exist in much greater quantities than was wanted. 
All such things, whether labour or worsted stocking, 
or broadcloth, are, of course, always regulated by the 
proportion between the supply and demand. Mr. 
Nicol cites an instance of a parish in Suffolk, where 
the labourer receives sixpence from the farmers, and 
the rest is made up by the rates ; and for this he re- 
probates the conduct of the farmers. But why are 
they not to take labour as cheap as they can get it ? 
| Why are they not to avail themselves of the market 
I price of this, as of any other commodity ? The rates 
j are a separate consideration ; let them supply what 
[is wanting ; but the farmer is right to get his iron, his 
[wood, and his labour, as cheap as he can. It would, 
| we admit, come nearly to the same thing, if 100Z. were 
[paid in wages rather than 251. in wages, and 151. by 
[rate ; but then if the farmers were to agree to give 
[wages above the market price, and sufficient for the 
[support of the labourers without any rate, such an 
[agreement could never be adhered to. The base and 
[the crafty would make their labourers take less, and 
[fling heavier rates upon those who adhered to the 
[contract; whereas, the agreement, founded upon giv- 
ing as little as can be given, is pretty sure of being 
[adhered to ; and he who breaks it, lessens the rate to 
[his neighbour, and does not increase it. The problem 
[to be solved is this : If you have ten or twenty labour- 
ers who say they can get no work, and you cannot 
llispute this, and the poor laws remain, what better 
[scheme can be devised, than that the farmers of the 
[parish should employ them in their turns ?— and what 
[more absurd than to suppose that the farmer so em- 
ploying them should give one farthing more than the 
Iharket price for their labour ? 

I It is contended, that the statute of Elizabeth, rightly 
Interpreted, only compels the overseer to assist the 
[rick and old, and not to find labour for strong and 
lealthy men. This is true enough ; and it would have 
jeen eminently useful to have attended to it a century 
past : but to find employment for all who apply, is now 
yy long use become a practical part of the poor-laws, 
md will require the same care and dexterity for its 
ibolition as any other part of that pernicious system. 
ft would not be altogether prudent suddeidy to tell a 
nillion of stout men, with spades and hoes in their 
aands, that the 43d of Elizabeth had been misconstru- 
;d, and that no more employment would be found for 
hem. It requires twenty or thirty years to state such 
.ruths to such numbers. 

[ We think, then, that the diminution of the claims of 
[settlement, and the authority of justices, coupled with 
Lhe other subordinate improvements we have stated, 
brill be the best steps for beginning the abolition of 
the poor-laws. When these have been taken, the de- 
scription of persons entitled to relief may be gradually 
harrowed by degrees. But let no man hope to get rid 
Ibf these laws, even in the gentlet and wisest method, 
[without a great deal of misery and some risk of tumult. 
kf Mr. Bourne thinks only of avoiding risk, he will do 
lothing. Some risk must be incurred : but the secret 



is gradation ; and the true reason for abolishing these 
laws is, not that they make the rich poor, but they 
make the poor poorer.* 



poor poorer. 



ANASTASIUS. (Edinburgh Review, 1821.) 

Anastasius; or, Memoirs of a Greek, written in the 18t?i Cen- 
tury. London. Murray. 3 vols. 8vo. 

Anastasius is a sort of oriental Gil Bias, who is 
tossed about from one state of life to another,— .some- 
times a beggar in the streets of Constantinople, and 
at others, an officer of the highest distinction under an 
Egyptian Bey,— with that mixture of good and evil, 
of loose principles and popular qualities, which, against 
our moral feelings and better judgment, render a novel 
pleasing, and an hero popular. Anastasius is a greater 
villain than Gil Bias, merely because he acts in a worse 
country, and under a worse government. Turkey is a 
country in the last stage of Castlereagh-ery and Vansit- 
tartism ; it is in that condition to which we are steadi- 
ly approaching— a political finish ;— the sure result of 
just and necessary wars, interminable burthens upon 
affectionate people, green bags, strangled sultanas, 
and murdered mobs. There are, in the world, all 
shades and gradations of tyranny. The Turkish, or 
last, puts the pistol and stiletto in action. Anastasius, 
therefore, among his other pranks, makes nothing of 
two or three murders ; but they are committed in cha- 
racter, and are suitable enough to the temper aud dis- 
position of a lawless Turkish soldier ; and this is the 
justification of the book, which is called wicked but 
for no other reason than because it accurately paints 
the manners of a people become wicked from the long 
and uncorrected abuses of their government. 

One cardinal fault which pervades this work is, that 
it is too long ; — in spite of the numerous fine passages 
with which it abounds, there is too much of it ; — and it 
is a relief, not a disappointment to get to the end. Mr. 
Hope, too, should avoid humour, in which he certainly 
does not excel. His attempts of that nature are among 
the most serious parts of the book. With all these 
objections, (and we only mention them in case Mr. 
Hope writes again,) there are few books in the Eng- 
lish language which contain passages of greater power, 
feeling, and eloquence than this novel, — which deline- 
ate frailty and vice with more energy and acuteness, 
or describe historical scenes with such bold imagery, 
and such glowing language. Mr. Hope will excuse us, 
— but we could not help exclaiming, in reading it, Is 
this Mr. Thomas Hope ? — Is this the man of chairs 
and tables — the gentleman of sphinxes — the OZdipus 
of coal-boxes — he who meditated on muffineers and 
planned pokers ? — Where has he hidden all this elo- 
quence and poetry up to this hour ? — How is it that he 
has, all of a sudden, burst out into descriptions which 
would not disgrace the pen of Tacitus — and displayed 
a depth of feeling and a vigour of imagination which 
Lord Byron could not excel ? We do not shrink from 
one syllable of this eulogium. The work now before 
us places him at once in the highest list of eloquen 
writers, and of superior men. 

Anastasius, the hero of the tale, is a native of Chi- 
os, the son of the drogueman to the French consul. 
The drogueman, instead of bringing him up to make 
Latin verses, suffered him to run wild about the 
streets of Chios, where he lives for some time a lub- 
berly boy, and then a profligate youth. His first ex- 
ploit is to debauch the daughter of his acquaintance, 
from whom (leaving her in a state of pregnancy) , he 
runs away, and enters as a cabin boy in a Venetian 
brig. The brig is taken by Maynote pirates : the pi- 
rates by a Turkish frigate, by which he is landed at 
Nauplia, and marched away to Argos, where the cap- 
tain, Hassan Pacha, was encamped with his army. 

' I had never seen an encampment : and the novel and strik- 
ing sight absorbed all my faculties in astonishment and awe. 

* The boldness of modern legislation has thrown all my cau- 
tion into the background. Was it wise to encounter such a 
risk ? Is the danger over? Can the vital parts of the bill b« 
maintained ? 



224 



WORKS OF THE REV. SIDNEY SMITH. 



There seemed to me to be forces sufficient to subdue the whole 
world ; and I know not which most to admire, the endless 
clusters of tents, the enormous piles of armour, and the rows 
of threatening cannon, which I met at every step, or the troops 
of well mounted spahees, who, like dazzling meteors, darted 
by us on every side, amid clouds of stifling dust. The very 
dirt with which the nearer horsemen bespattered our humble 
troop, was, as I thought, imposing j and every thing upon 
which I cast my eyes gave me a feeling of nothingness, which 
made me shrink within myself like a snail in its cell. I envied 
not only those who were destined to share in all the glory and 
success of the expedition, but even the meanest follower of the 
camp, as a being of a superior order to myself; and, when sud- 
denly there arose a loud flourish of trumpets, which, ending a 
concert of cymbals and other warlike instruments, re-echoed 
in long peals from all the surrounding mountains, the clang 
shook every nerve in my body, thrilled me to the very soul, 
and infused in all my veins a species of martial ardour so re- 
sistless, that it made me struggle with my fetters, and try to 
tear them asunder. Proud as I was by nature, I would have 
knelt to whoever had offered to liberate my limbs, and to arm 
my hands with a sword or a battle-axe.' — (I. 36, 37.) 

From his captive state, he passes into the service 
of Mavroyeni, Hassan's droguemau, with whom he in- 
gratiates himself and becomes a person of conse- 
quence. In the service of this person, he receives 
from old Demo, a brother domestic, the following ad- 
mirable lecture on masters : — 

' " Listen, young man," said he, " whether you like jit or not. 
For my own part, I have always had too much indolence, not 
to make it my study throughout life rather to secure ease than 
labour for distinction. It has, therefore, been my rule to avoid 
cherishing in my patron any outrageous admiration of my ca- 
pacity, which would have increased my dependence while it 
lasted, and expose me to persecution on wearing out : — but 
you, I see, are of a different mettle : I therefore may point out 
to you the surest way to that more perilous height, short of 
which your ambition, I doubt, will not rest satisfied. When 
you have compassed it, you may remember old Demo, if you 
please. 

' " Know first that all masters, even the least lovable, like to 
be loved. All wish to be served from affection rather than 
duty. It flatters their pride, and it gratifies their selfishness. 
They expect from this personal motive a greater devotion to 
their interest, and a more unlimited obedience to their com- 
mands. A master looks upon mere fidelity in his servant as 
his due — as a thing scarce worth his thanks: but attachment 
he considers as a compliment to his merit, and if at all gener- 
ous, he will reward it with liberality. Mavroyeni is more 
open than any body to this species of flattery. Spare it not, 
therefore. If he speak to you kindly, let your face brighten 
up. If he talk to you of his own affairs, though it should only 
be to dispel the tedium of conveying all day long other men's 
thoughts, listen with the greatest eagerness. A single yawn, 
and you are undone ! Yet let not curiosity appear your mo- 
tive, but the delight only of being honoured with his confi- 
dence. The more you appear grateful for the least kindness, 
the oftener you will receive important favours. Our ostenta- 
tious drogueman will feel a pleasure in raising your astonish- 
ment. His vanity knows no bounds. Give it scope, therefore. 
When he comes home choking with its suppressed ebullitions, 
be their ready and patient receptacle :— <lo more ; discreetly 
help him on in venting his conceit ; provide him with a cure ; 
hint what you heard certain people, not knowing you to be so 
near, say of his capacity, his merit, and his influence. He 
wishes to persuade the world that he completely rules the 
pasha. Tell him not flatly he does, but assume it as a thing 
of general notoriety. Be neither too candid in your remarks, 
nor too fulsome in your flattery. Too palpable deviations 
from fact might appear a satire on your master's understand- 
ing. Should some disappointment evidently ruffle his temper, 
appear not to conceive the possibility of his vanity having re- 
ceived a mortification. Preserve the exact medium between 
too cold a respect, and too presumptuous a forwardness. How- 
ever much Mavroyeni may caress you in private, never seem 
quite at ease with him in public. A master still likes to re- 
main master, or, at least, to appear so to others. Should you 
get into some scrape, wait not to confess your imprudence, 
until concealment becomes impossible ; nor try to excuse the 
offence. Rather than that you should, by so doing, appear to 
make light of your guilt, exaggerate your self-upbraidings, 
and throw yourself entirely upon the drogueman's mercy. On 
all occasions take care how you appear cleverer than your 
lord, even in the splitting of a pen ; or, if you cannot avoid ex- 
celling him in some trifle, give his own tuition all the credit of 
your proficiency. Many things he will dislike, only because 
they come not from himself. Vindicate not your innocence 
when unjustly rebuked : rather submit for the moment ; and 
trust that, though Mavroyeni never will expressly acknowledge 
his error, he will in due time pay you for your forbearance." ' 
—(1.43—45.) 

la the course of his service with Mavroyeui, he 



bears arms against the Arnoots, under the Captain 
Hassan Pacha ; and a very animated description is gi« 
ven of his first combat. 

'I undressed the dead man completely. — When, however, 
the business which engaged all my attention was entirely 
achieved, and that human body of which, in the eagerness for 
its spoil, 1 had only thus far noticed the separate limbs, one by 
one, as I stripped them, all at once struck my sight in its full 
dimensions, as it lay naked before me ; when I contemplated 
that fine athletic frame, but a moment before full of life and 
vigour unto its fingers' ends, now rendered an insensible corpse 
by the random shot of a raw youth whom in close combat its 
little finger might have crushed, I could not help feeling, mixed 
with my exultation, a sort of shame, as if for a cowardly ad- 
vantage obtained over a superior being ; and in order to make 
a kind of atonement to the shade of an Epirote — of a kinsman 
— I exclaimed with outstretched hands, "Cursed be the paltry 
dust which turns the warrior's arm into a mere engine, and 
striking from afar an invisible blow, carries death no one knows 
whence to no one knows whom; levels the strong with the 
weak, the brave with the dastardly; and enabling the feeblest 
hand to wield its fatal lightning, makes the conqueror slay 
without anger, and the conquered die without glory." ' — (1. 54, 

The campaign ended, he proceeds to Constantinople 
with the drogueman, where his many intrigues and 
debaucheries end with the drogueman's turning him 
out of doors. He lives for some time at Constantino- 
ple in great misery ; and is driven, among other expe- 
dients, to the trade of quack-doctor. 

'One evening, as we were returning from the Blacqucrnes, 
an old woman threw herself in our way, and, taking hold of my 
master's garment, dragged him almost by main force after her 
into a mean-looking habitation just by, where lay on a couch, 
apparently at the last gasp, a man of foreign features. " I 
have brought a physician," said the female to the patient, 
" who perhaps may relieve you." " Why will you" — answered 
he faintly — " still persist to feed idle hopes ! I have lived an 
outcast : suffer me at least to die in peace ; nor disturb my last 
moments by vain illusions. My soul pants to rejoin the Su- 
preme Spirit ; arrest not its flight ; it would only be delaying 
my eternal bliss ! " 

'As the stranger spoke these words — which struck even Ya- 
coob sufficiently to make him suspend his professional grimace 
— the last beams of the setting sun darted across the casement oi 
the window upon his pale yet swarthy features. Thus visited, 
he seemed for a moment to revive. "I have always," said he, 
" considered my fate as connected with the great luminary that 
rules the creation. I have always paid it due worship, and 
firmly believed I could not breathe my last while its rays shone 
upon me. Carry, me therefore, out, that I may take my last 
farewell of the heavenly ruler of my earthly destinies ! " 

' We all rushed forward to obey the mandate ; but the stairs 
being too narrow, the woman only opened the window, and 
placed the dying man before it, so as to enjoy the full view of 
the glorious orb, just in the act of dropping beneath the hori- 
zon. He remained a few moments in silent adoration; and 
mechanically we all joined him in fixing our eyes on the object 
of his worship. It set in all its splendour; and when its 
golden disk had entirely disappeared, we looked round at the 
Parsee. He too, had sunk into everlasting rest.' — (1. 103, 104.) 

From the dispensation of chalk and water, he is then 
ushered into a Turkish jail, the description of which, 
and of the plague with which it is visited, are very 
finely written; and we strongly recommend them to 
the attention of our readers. 

'Every day a capital, fertile in crimes, pours new offenders 
into this dread receptacle; and its high walls and deep reces- 
ses resound every instant with imprecations and curses, uttered 
in all the various idioms of the Ottoman empire. Deep moan? 
and dismal yells leave not its frightful echoes a moment's re- 
pose. From morning till night and from night till morning, 
the ear is stunned with the clang of chains, which the galley- 
slaves wear while confined to their cells, and which they still 
drag about while toiling at their tasks. Linked together two< 
and two for life, should they sink under their sufferings, they\ 
still continue unsevered after death ; and the man doomed to 
live on, drags after him the corpse of his dead companion. In 
no direction can the eye escape the spectacle of atrocious pun- 
ishments and of indescribable agonies. Here perhaps, you see 
a wretch whoso stiffened limbs refuse their office, stop sud-i 
denly short in the midst of his labour, and as if already impas- 
sible, defy the stripes that lay open his flesh, and wait in total 
immobility the last merciful blow that is to end his misery ; 
while there you view his companion foaming with rage and 
madness, turn against his own person his desperate hands, tear 
his clotted hair, rend his bleeding bosom, and strike his skull, 
until it burst, against the wall of his dungeon.'— (1. 110, 111.) 

A few survived. 



ANASTASIUS. 



835 



* I was among these scanty relics. I who, indifferent to life, 
and never stooped to avoid the shafts of death, even when they 
flew thickest around me, had more than once laid my finger on 
the livid wound they inflicted, had probed it as it festered ; I 
yet remained unhurt: for sometimes the plague is a magnani- 
mous enemy, and while it seldom spares the pusillanimous 
victim, whose blood, running cold ere it is tainted, lacks the 
energy necessary to repel the infection when at hand, it will 
pass him by who dares its utmost fury, and advances un- 
daunted to meet its raised dart.*— (1. 121.) 

In this miserable receptacle of guilty and unhappy 
beings, Anastasius forms and cements the strongest 
friendship with a young Greek, of the name of Anag- 
nosti. On leaving the prison, he vows to make 
every exertion for the liberation of his friend — vows 
that are forgotten as soon as he is clear from the 
prison walls. After being nearly perished with hun- 
ger, and after being saved by the charity of an hospi- 
tal, he gets into an intrigue with a rich Jewess — is de- 
tected — pursued — and, to save his life, turns Mussul- 
man. This exploit performed, he suddenly meets his 
friend Anagnosti — treats him with disdain — and, in a 
quarrel which ensues between them, stabs him to the 
heart. 

'"Life," says the dying Anagnosti, "has long been bitter- 
ness : death is a welcome guest : 1 rejoin those that love me, 
and in a better place. Alread}', methinks, watching my flight, 
they stretch out their arms from heaven to their dying Anag- 
nosti. Thou — if there be in thy breast one spark of pity left 
for him thou once namedst thy brother ; for him to whom a 
holy tie, a sacred vow .... Ah ! suffer not the starving hounds 
in the street .... See a little hallowed earth thrown over my 
wretched corpse." These words were his last.' — (I. 209.) 

The description of the murderer's remorse is among 
the finest passages in the work. 

* From an obscure aisle in the church I beheld the solemn 
service: saw on the field of death the pale stiff corpse lowered 
into its narrow cell, and hoping to exhaust sorrow's bitter cup, 
at night, when all mankind hushed its griefs, went back to my 
friend's final resting place, lay down upon his silent grave, and 
watered with my tears the fresh-raised hollow mound. 

4 In vain! Nor my tears nor my sorrows could avail. No 
offerings nor penance could purchase me repose. Wherever I 
went, the beginning of our friendship and its issue still alike 
rose in view ; the fatal spot of blood still danced before my 
steps, and the reeking dagger hovered before my aching eyes. 
In the silent darkness of the night I saw the pale phantom of 
my friend stalk round my watchful couch, covered with gore 
and dust: and even during the unavailing riots of day, I still 
beheld the spectre rise over the festive board, glare on me with 
piteous look, and hand me whatever I attempted to reach. 
But whatever it presented seemed blasted by its touch. T° my 
wine it gave the taste of blood, and to my bread the rank fla- 
vour of death ! '—(1. 212, 213.) 

We question whether there is in the English lan- 
guage a finer description than this. We request our 
readers to look at the very beautiful and affecting 
picture of remorse, pp. 214, 215, vol. i. 

Equally good, but in another way, is the description 
of the opium coffee-house. 

1 In this tchartchee might be seen any day a numerous col- 
lection of those whom private sorrows have driven to a public 
exhibition of insanity. There each reeling idiot might take 
his neighbour by the hand, and say, " Brother, and what ailed 
thee, to seek so dire a cure ? " There did I, with the rest of its 
familiars, now take my habitual station in my solitary niche, 
like an insensible motionless idol, sitting with sightless eyeballs 
staring on vacuity. 

' One day, as I lay in less entire absence than usual under 
the purple vines of the porch, admiring the gold-tipped domes 
of the majestic Sulimanye, the appearance of an old man with 
a snow-white beard, reclining on the couch beside me, caught 
my attention. Half plunged in stupor, he every now and then 
burst out into a wild laugh, occasioned by the grotesque phan- 
tasms which the ample dose of madjoon he had just swallowed 
was sending up to his brain. I sat contemplating him with 
mixed curiosity and dismay, when, as if for a moment roused 
from his torpor, he took me by the hand, and fixing on my 
countenance, his dim vacant eyes, said in an impressive tone, 
" Young man, thy days are yet few ; take the advice of one 
who, alas! has counted many. Lose no time; hie thee hence, 
nor cast behind one lingering look : but if thou hast not the 
strength, why tarry even here? Thy journey is but half 
achieved. At once go on to that large mansion before thee. 
It is thy ultimate destination : and by thus beginning where 
thou must end at last, thou mayest at least save both thy time 
and thy money.'— (1. 315, 316.> 



Lingering in the streets of Constantinople, Anas- 
tasius hears that his mother is dead, and proceeds to 
claim that heritage which, by the Turkish law in 
favour of proselytes, had devolved upon him. 

' How often,' he exclaims (after seeing his father in the ex- 
tremity of old age) — 'how often does it happen in life, that the 
most blissful moments of our return to our long left home are 
only those that just precede the instant of our arrival; those 
during which the imagination still is allowed to paint in its 
own unblended colours the promised sweets of our reception ! 
How often, after this glowing picture of the phantasy, does 
the reality which follows appear cold and dreary ! How often 
do even those who grieved to see us depart, grieve more to see 
us return ! and how often do we ourselves encounter nothing 
but sorrow, on again beholding the once happy, joyous pro- 
moters of our own hilarity, now mournful, and themselves dis- 
appointed, and themselves needing what consolation we may 
bring ! '—(I. 239, 240.) 

During his visit to Chios, he traces and describes 
the dying misery of Helena, whom he had deserted, 
and then debauches her friend Agnes. From thence 
he sails to Rhodes, the remnants of which produce a 
great deal of eloquence and admirable description — 
(pp. 275, 276, vol. i.) From Rhodes he sails to Egypt ; 
and chap. 16 contains a short and very well written 
history of the origin and progress of the Mameluke 
government. The flight of Mourad, and the pursuit of 
this chief in the streets of Cairo,* would be considered 
as very fine passages in the best histories of antiquity. 
Our limits prevent us from quoting them. Anastasius 
then becomes a Mameluke; marries his master's 
daughter ; and is made a kiashef. In the numerous 
skirmishes into which he falls in his new military life, 
it falls to his lot to shoot, from an ambush, Assad, his 
inveterate enemy. 

'Assad, though weltering in his blood, was still alive: bu* 
the angel of death flapped his dark wings over the traitor's 
brow. Hearing footsteps advance, he made an effort to raise 
his head, probably in hopes of approaching succour : but be- 
holding, but recognizing only me, he felt that no hopes re- 
mained, and gave a groan of despair. Life was flowing out so 
fast, that I had only to stand still — my arms folded in each 
other — and with a steadfast eye watch its departure. One in- 
stant I saw my vanquished foe, agitated by a convulsive tre- 
mor, open his eyes and dart at me a glance of impotent rage ; 
but soon he averted them again, then gnashed his teeth, 
clenched his fist, and expired.' — (II. 92.) 

We quote this, and such passages as these, to show 
the great power of description which Mr. Hope pos- 
sesses. The vindictive man standing with his arms 
folded, and watching the blood flowing from the wound 
of his enemy, is very new and very striking. 

After the death of his wife, he collects his property, 
quits Egypt, and visits Mekkah, and acquires the title 
and prerogatives of an Hadjee. After this he returns 
to the Turkish capital, renews his acquaintance with 
Spiridion, the friend of his youth, who in vain labours 
to reclairjT him, and whom he at last drives away, dis- 
gusted with the vices and passions of Anastasius. We 
then find our oriental profligate fighting as Turkish 
captain in Egypt, against his old friends the Mame- 
lukes ; and afterwards employed in Wallachia, under 
his old friend Mavroyeni, against the Russians and 
Austrians. In this part of the work, we strongly re- 
commend to our readers to look at the Mussulmans 
in a pastry-cook's shop during the Rhamadam, vol. ii. 
p. 164; the village of beggars, vol. ii. p. 266; the 
death of the Hungarian officer, vol. ii. p. 327 ; and, in 
the last days of Mavroyeni, vol. ii. p. 356 ; — not for- 
getting the walk over a field of battle, vol. ii. p. 252. 
The character of Mavroyeni is extremely well kept 
up through the whole of the book ; and his decline and 
death are drawn in a very spirited and masterly man- 
ner. The Spiridion part of the novel we are not so much 
struck with ; we entirely approve of Spiridion, and 
ought to take more interest in him ; but we cannot 
disguise the melancholy truth that he is occasionally a 
little long and tiresome. The next characters as- 
sumed by Anastasius are, a Smyrna debauchee, a 
robber of the desert, and a Wahabee. After serving 
some time with these sectaries, he returns to Smyrna 
—finds his child missing whom he had left there— 

* P. 325, voL V 



236 



WORKS OFTHE REV. SIDNEY SMITH. 



traces the little boy to Egypt— recovers him— then 
loses him by sickness— and wearied of life, retires to 
end his days in a cottage in Carinthia. For striking 
passages in this part of the novel, we refer our readers 
to the description of the burial-places near Constanti- 
nople, vol. iii. 11—13; the account of Djezzar Pacha's 
retirement to his harem during the revolt — equal to 
any thing in Tacitus ; and, above all, to the landing 
of Anastasius with his sick child, and the death of the 
infant. It is impossible not to see that this last pic- 
ture is faithfuDy drawn from a sad and cruel reality. 
The account of the Wahabees is very interesting, vol. 
iii. 128 ; and nothing is more so than the story of 
Euphrosyne. Anastasius had gained the affections of 
Euphrosyne, and ruined her reputation ;. he then 
wishes to cast her off, and to remove her from his 
house. 

' " Ah no !" now cried Euphrosyne, convulsively clasping my 
knees, " be not so barbarous ! Shut not your own door against 
her against whom you have barred every once friendly door. 
Do not deny her whom you have dishonoured the only asylum 
she has left. If I cannot be your wife, let me be your slave, 
your drudge. No service, however mean, shall I recoil from 
when you command. At least before you I shall not have to 
blush. In your eyes I shall not be what I must seem in those 
of others ; I shall not from you incur the contempt which I 
must expect from my former companions ; and ray diligence 
to execute the lowest offices you may require, will earn for me, 
not only as a bare alms at your hands, that support which, 
however scanty, I can elsewhere only receive as an unmerited 
indulgence. Since I did a few days please your eye, I may 
still please it a few days longer :— perhaps a few days longer, 
therefore, I may still wish to live ; and when that last blessing, 
your love, is gone by, — when my cheek, faded with grief, has 
lost the last attraction that could arrest your favour, then 
speak, then tell me so, that, burthening you no longer, I may 
retire— and die!"'— (III. 64, 65.) 

Her silent- despair, and patient misery, when she 
finds that she has not only ruined herself with the 
world, but lost his affections also, have the beauty of 
the deepest tragedy. 

S Nothing but the most unremitting tenderness on my part 
could in some degree have revived her drooping spirits.— But 
when, after my excursion, and the act of justice on Sophia, in 
which it ended, I re-appeared before the still trembling Euphro- 
syne, she saw too soon that that cordial of the heart must not 
be expected. One look she cast upon my countenance, as I 
sat down in silence, sufficed to inform her of ray total change 
of sentiments ; — and the responsive look by which it was met, 
tore forever from her breast the last seeds of hope and confi- 
dence. Like the wounded snail she shrunk within herself, and 
thenceforth,cloaked in unceasing sadness, never more expanded 
to the sunshine of joy. With her buoyancy of spirits she seem- 
ed even to lose all her quickness of intellect, nay, all her readi- 
ness of speech : so that, not only fearing to embark with her 
in serious conversation, but even finding no response in her 
mind to lighter topics, I at last began to nauseate her seeming 
torpor and dulness, and to roam abroad even more frequently 
than before a partner of my fate remained at home, to count 
the tedious hours of my absence ; while she, poor miserable 
creature, dreading the sneers of an unfeeling world, passed 
her time under my roof in dismal and heart-breaking solitude. 
—Had the most patient endurance of the most intemperate 
sallies been able to soothe my disappointment and to soften my 
hardness, Euphrosyne 's angelic sweetness must at last have 
conquered : but, in my jaundiced eye, her resignation only 
tended to strengthen the conviction of her shame ; and I saw 
in her forbearance nothing but the consequence of her debase- 
ment, and the consciousness of her guilt. " Did her heart," 
thought I, " bear witness to a purity on which my audacity 
dared first to cast a blemish, she could not remain thus tame, 
thus spiritless, under 6uch an aggravation of my wrongs ; and 
either she would be the first to quit my merciless roof, or, at 
«a8t, she would not so fearfully avoid giving me even the most 
unfounded pretence for denying her its shelter.— She must 
merit her sufferings, to bear them so meekly ! "—Hence, even 
when moved to real pity by gentleness so enduritfg, I seldom 
relented in my apparent sternness.'— (III. 72—74.) 

With this, we end our extracts from Anastasius. — 
We consider it as a work in which great and extraor- 
dinary talent is evinced. It abounds in eloquent and 
sublime passages, — in sense, — in knowledge of histo- 
ry, — and in knowledge of human character ; but not 
in wit. It is too long ; and if this novel perishes, and 
is forgotten, it will be solely on that account. If it is 
the picture of vice, so is Clarissa Harlowe, and so is 
Tom Jones. There are no sensual and glowing de- 



scriptions in Anastasius,— nothing which corrupts Vhe 
morals by inflaming the imagination of youth ; and 
we are quite certain that every reader ends this novel 
with a greater disgust at vice, and a more thorough con- 
viction of the necessity of subjugating passion, than 
he feels from reading either of the celebrated works 
we have just mentioned. The sum of our eulogium is 
that Mr. Hope, without being very successful in his 
style, or remarkably skilful hi the delineation of char- 
acter, has written a novel, which all clever people of 
a certain age should read, because it is full of marvel- 
lously fine things 



SCARLETT'S POOR BILL. (Edinburgh Review, 
1821.) 

1. Letter to James Scarlet, Esq., M. P., on his Bill relating 
to the Poor-Laws. By a Surrey Magistrate. London, 1821. 

2. An Address to the Imperial Parliament, upon the Practical 
Means of gradually Abolishing the Poor-Laws, and Educa- 
ting the Poor Systematically. Illustrated by an Account of 
the Colonies of Fredericks-Oordin Holland, and of the Com- 
mon Mountain in the South of Ireland. With General Ob- 
servations. Third Edition. By William Herbert Saunders, 
Esq. London, 1821. 

3. On Pauperism and the Poor-Laws. With a Supplement. 
London, 1821. 

We are friendly to the main principle of Mr, Scar- 
lett's bill ; but are rather surprised at the unworkman- 
like manner in which he has set about it. 

To fix a maximum for the poor-rates, we should con- 
ceive to be an operation of sufficient difficulty and 
novelty to any one bill. There was no need to pro- 
voke more prejudice, to rouse more hostility, and cre- 
ate more alarm, than such a bill would naturally do. 
But Mr. Scarlett is a very strong man ; and before he 
works his battering-ram, he chooses to have the Avail 
made of a thickness worthy of his blow — capable of 
evincing, by the enormity of its ruins, the superfluity 
of his vigour, and the certainty of his aim. Accord- 
ingly, he has introduced into his bill a number of pro- 
visions, Avhich have no necessary, and indeed, no near 
connection with his great and main object ; but which 
are sure to draw upon his back all the Sir Johns and 
Sir Thomases in the House of Commons. It may be 
right, or it may be wrong, that the chargeable poor 
should be removed ; but why introduce such a contro- 
verted point into a bill framed for a much more impor- 
tant object, and of itself calculated to produce so 
much difference of opinion ! Mr. Scarlett appears to 
us to have been not only indiscreet in the introduction 
of such heterogeneous matter, but very much mista- 
ken in the enactments which that matter contains. 

'And be it further enacted, that from and after the passing 
of this act, it shall not be lawful for any justice of peace or 
other person to remove, or cause to be removed, any poor 
person or persons from any parish, township or place, to any 
other, by reason of such person or persons being chargeable to 
such parish, township or place, or being unable to maintain 
him or themselves, or under colour of such person or persons 
being settled in any other parish, township or place, any law 
or statute to the contrary notwithstanding : Provided always, 
that nothing in this act shall in any wise be deemed to alter 
any law now in force for the punishment of vagrants, or for 
removing poor persons to Scotland, Ireland, or the Isles of 
Guernsey, Jersey, and Man.— And be it further enacted, that 
in cases where any poor person, at the time of the passing of 
this act, shall be resident in any parish, township or place, 
where he is not legally settled, and shall be receiving relief 
from the overseers, guardians, or directors of the poor of the 
place of his legal settlement, the said overseers, guardians, or 
directors, are hereby required to continue such relief, in the 
same manner, and by the same means, as the same is now ad- 
ministered, until one of his majesty's justices of the peace, in 
or near the place of residence of such poor person, shall, upon 
application to him, either by such poor person, or any other 
on his behalf, for the continuance thereof, or by the said over- 
seers, guardians, or directors of the poor, paying such relief, 
for the discharge thereof, certify that the same is no longer 
necessary.'— {Bill, pp. 3, 4.) 

Now, here is a gentleman, so thoroughly and so just, 
ly sensible of the evils of the poor-laws, that he intro- 
duces into the House of Commons a very plain and I 
very bold measure to restrain them ; and yet in the 



SCARLETT'S POOR BILL. 



227 



7erysame bill, he abrogates the few impediments that I one of the most extraordinary we ever remember to 
remain to universal mendicity. The present law says, have been introduced into any act of Parliament. 
' Before you can turn beggar in the place of your resi 



dence, you must have been born there, or you must 
have rented a farm there, or served an office ;' but Mr. 
Scarlett says, ' You may beg anywhere where you 
happen to be. I will have no obstacles to your turn- 
ing beggar ; I will give every facility and every allure- 
ment to the destruction of your independence.' We 
are quite confident that the direct tendency of Mr. 
Scarlett's enactments is to produce these effects. La- 
bourers living in one place, and settled in another, are 
uniformly the best and most independent characters 
in the place. Alarmed at the idea of being removed 
from the situation of their choice, and knowing they 
have nothing to depend upon but themselves, they are 
alone exempted from the degrading influence of the 
poor-laws, and frequently arrive at independence by 
their exclusion from that baneful privilege which is of- 
fered to them by the inconsistent benevolence of this 
bill. If some are removed, after long residence in 
parishes where they are not settled, these examples 
only insure the beneficial effect of which we have been 
speaking. Others see them, dread the same fate, quit 
the mug, and grasp the flail. Our policy, as we have 
explained in a previous article, is directly the reverse 
of that of Mr. Scarlett. Considering that a poor man, 
since Mr. East's bill, if he asks no charity, has a right 
to live where he pleases, and that a settlement is now 
nothing more than a beggar's ticket, we would gradu- 
ally abolish all means of gaining a settlement, but 
those of birth, parentage, or marriage; and this me- 
thod would destroy litigation as effectually as the me- 
thod proposed by Mr. Scarlett.* 

Mr. Scarlett's plan, too, we are firmly persuaded, 
would completely defeat his own intentions ; and would 
inflict a greater injury upon the poor than this very bill, 
intended to prevent their capricious removal. If this 
bill had passed, he could not have passed. His post 
chaise on the northern circuit would have been impe- 
ded by the crowds of houseless villagers, driven from 
their cottages by landlords rendered merciless by the 
bill. In the mud — all in the mud (for such cases made 
and provided) would they have rolled this most excel- 
lent counsellor. Instigated by the devil and their own 
malicious purposes, his wig they would have polluted, 
and tossed to a thousand winds the parchment bicker- 
ings of Doe and Roe. Mr. Scarlett's bill is so power- 
ful a motive to proprietors for the depopulation of a 
village — for preventing the poor from living where they 
wish to live, — that nothing but the conviction that such 
a bill would be suffered to pass, has prevented those 
effects from already taking place. Landlords would 
in the contemplation of such a bill, pull down all the 
cottages of persons not belonging to the parish, and 
eject the tenants ; the most vigorous measures would 
be taken to prevent any one from remaining or com- 
ing who was not absolutely necessary to the lord of 
the soil. At present, cottages are let to any body ; 
because, if they are burthensome to the parish, the 
tenants can be removed. But the impossibility of do- 
ing this would cause the immediate demolition of cot- 
tages ; prevent the erection of fresh ones where they 
are really wanted ; and chain a poor man forever to 
the place of his birth, without the possibility of mo- 
ving. If every body who passed over Mr. Scarlett's 
threshold were to gain a settlement for life in his 
house, he would take good care never to be at home. 
We all boldly let our friends in, because we know we 
can easily get them out. So it was with the residence 
of the poor. Their present power of living where they 
please, and going where they please, entirely depends 
upon the possibility of their removal when they be- 
come chargeable. If any mistaken friend were to take 
from them this protection, the whole power and jeal- 
ousy of property would be turned against their loco- 
motive liberty; they would become adscripti glebce, 
no more capable of going out of the parish than a tree 
is of proceeding, with its roots and branches, to a 
neighbouring wood. 
The remedy here proposed for these evils is really 

* This has since been done. 



' And whereas it may happen, that in several parishes or 
townships now burdened with the maintenance of the poor 
settled and residing therein, the owners of lands or inhabit- 
ants may, in order to remove the residence of the labouring 
poor from such parishes or places, destroy the cottages and 
habitations therein, now occupied by the labourers and their 
families: And whereas, also, it may happen, that certain towns 
and villages, maintaining their own poor, may, by the resi- 
dence therein of labourers employed and working in other pa- 
rishes or townships lying near the said towns and villages, be 
charged with the burden of maintaining those who do not 
work, and before the passing of this act were not settled 
therein ; For remedy thereof, be it enacted, by the authority 
aforesaid, that, in either of ^he above cases, it shall be lawful 
for the justices, at any quarter-sessions of the peace held for 
the county in which sucli places shall be, upon the complaint 
of the overseers of the poor of any parish, town or place, that 
by reason of either of the causes aforesaid, the rates for the re- 
lief of the poor of such parish, town or place, have been ma- 
terially increased, whilst those of any other parish or place 
have been diminished, to hear and fully to inquire into the 
matter of such complaint ; and in case they shall be satisfied 
of the truth thereof, then to make an order upon the overseers 
of the poor of the parish or township, whose rates have been 
diminished by the causes aforesaid, to pay to the complainants 
such sum or sums from time to time, as the said justices shall 
adjudge reasonable, not exceeding, in any case, together with 
the existing rates, the amount limited by this act, as a contri- 
bution towards the relief of the poor of the parish, town, or 
place, whose rates have been increased by the causes afore- 
said ; which order shall continue in force until the same shall 
be discharged by some future order of sessions, upon the ap- 
plication of the overseers paying the same, and proof that the 
occasion for it no longer exists : Provided always, that no 
such order shall be made, without proof of notice in writing of 
such intended application, and of the grounds thereof having 
been served upon the overseers of the poor of the parish cr 
place, upon whom such order is prayed, fourteen days at the 
least before the first day of the quarter-sessions, nor unless the 
justices making such order shall be satisfied that no money has 
been improperly or unnecessarily expended by the overseers 
of the poor praying for such orde*; and that a separate and 
distinct account has been kept by them of the additional burdeu 
which has been thrown upon their rates by the causes alleged.' 
—{Bill, pp. 4, 5.) 

Now this clause, we cannot help saying, appears to 
us to be a receipt for universal and interminable liti- 
gation all over England — a perfect law-hurricane — a 
conversion of all flesh into plaintiffs and defendants. 
The parish A. has pulled down houses, and burthened 
the parish B. ; B. has demolished to the misery of C. ; 
which has again misbehaved itself in the same manner 
to the oppression of other letters of the alphabet. All 
run into parchment, and pant for revenge and exoner- 
ation. Though the fact may be certain enough, the 
causes which gave rise to it may be very uncertain ; 
and assuredly will not be admitted to have been those 
against which the statute has denounced these penal- 
ties. It will be alleged, therefore, that the houses 
were not pulled down to get rid of the poor, but be* 
cause they were not worth repair — because they ob- 
structed the squire's view — because rent was not paid. 
All these motives must go before the sessions, the last 
resource of legislators — the unhappy quarter-sessions 
pushed to the extremity of their wit by the plump con. 
tradictions of parish perjury. 

Another of the many sources of litigation, in this 
clause, is as follows : — A certain number of workmen 
five in a parish M., not being settled in it, and not 
working in it before the passing of this act. After the 
passing of this act, they become chargeable to M., 
whose poor-rales are increased. M. is to find out the 
parishes relieved from the burthen of these men, and 
to prosecute at the quarter-sessions for relief. But 
suppose the burthened parish to be in Yorkshire, and 
the relieved parish in Cornwall, are the quarter-sessions 
in Yorkshire to make an order of annual payment upon 
a parish in Cornwall? and Cornwall, in turn, upon 
Yorkshire ? How is the money to be transmitted ? 
What is the easy and cheap remedy, if neglected to be 
paid ? And if all this could be effected, what is it, af 
ter all, but the present system of removal rendered 
ten times more intricate, confused, and expensive ! 
Perhaps Mr. Scarlett means, that the parishes where 
these men worked, and which may happen to be with- 
in the jurisdiction of the justices, are to be taxed in 



WORKS OF THE REV. SIDNEY SMITH. 



aid of tluJ parish M., in proportion to the benefit they 
have received from the labour of men whose distresses 
they do not relieve. We must have, then, a detailed 
account of how much a certain carpenter worked in 
one parish, how much in another ; and enter into a 
species of evidence absolutely interminable. We hope 
Mr. Scarlett will not be angry with us ; we entertain 
for his abilities and character the highest possible res- 
pect ; but great lawyers have not leisure for these 
trifling details. It is very fortunate that a clause so 
erroneous in its view should be so inaccurate in its con- 
struction. If it were easy to comprehend it, and pos- 
sible to execute it, it would be necessary to repeal it. 

The shortest way, however, of mending all this, will 
be entirely to omit this part of the bill. We earnestly, 
but with very little hopes of success, exhort Mr. Scar- 
lett not to endanger the really important part of his 
project, by the introduction of a measure which has 
little to do with it, and which any quarter-session 
country squire can do as well or better than himself. 
The real question introduced by his bill is, whether or 
not a limit shall be put to the poor-laws ; and not only 
this, but whether their amount shall be gradually di- 
minished. 'To this batter and higher part of the law, 
we shall now address ourselves. 

In this, however, as well as in the former part of his 
bill, Mr. Scarlett becomes frightened at his own enact- 
ments, and repeals himself. Parishes are first to re- 
lieve every person actually resident within them. This 
is no sooner enacted, than a provision is introduced to 
relieve them from this expense, tenfold more burthen- 
some and expensive than the present system of remo- 
val. In the same manner, a maximum is very wisely 
and bravely enacted ; and in the following clause is 
immediately repealed. 

' Provided also, and be it further enacted, that if, by reason 
of any unusual scarcity of provisions, epidemic disease, or any 
other cause of a temporary or local nature, it shall be deemed 
expedient by the overseers of the poor, or other persons having, 
by virtue of any local act of Parliament, the authority of 
overseers of the poor of any parish, township, or place, to 
raake any addition to the sum assessed for the relief of the 
poor, beyond the amount limited by this act, it shall be lawful 
for the said overseers, or such other persons, to give public 
notice in the several churches, and other places of worship, 
within the same parish, township, or place, and if there be no 
church or chapel within such place, then in the* parish churcli 
or chapel next adjoining the same, of the place and time of a ge- 
neral meeting of the inhabitants paying to the relief of the 
poor within such parish, township, or place, for the purpose 
of considering the occasion and the amount of the proposed 
addition ; and, if it shall appear to the majority of the per- 
sons assembled at such meeting, that such addition shall be ne- 
cessary, then it shall be lawful to the overseers, or other per- 
sons having power to make assessments, to increase the assess- 
ment by the additional sum proposed and allowed, at such 
meeting, and for the justices, by whom such rate is to be allow- 
ed, upon due proof upon oath to be made before them, of the 
resolution of such meeting, and that the same was held after 
sufficient public notice to allow such rate with the proposed 
addition, specifying the exact amount thereof, with the rea- 
sons for allowing the same, upon the face of the rate.' — 
(Bill, p. 2). 

It would really seem, from these and other qualify- 
ing provisions, as if Mr. Scarlett had never reflected 
upon the consequences of his leading enactments till 
he had penned them ; and that he then set about find- 
ing how he could prevent himself from doing what he 
meant to do. To what purpose enact a maximum, if 
that maximum may at any time be repealed by the 
majority of the parishioners ? How will the compas- 
sion and charity which the poor laws have set to sleep 
be awakened, when such a remedy is at hand as the 
repeal of the maximum by a vote of the parish ? Will 
ardent and amiable men form themselves into volun- 
tary associations to meet any sudden exigency of fa- 
mine and epidemic disease, when this sleepy and 
sluggish method of overcoming the evil can be had re- 
course to ? As soon as it becomes really impossible 
to increase the poor fimd by law — when there is but 
little, and there can be no more, that little will be ad- 
ministered with the utmost caution ; claims will be 
minutely inspected ; idle manhood will not receive the 
scraps and crumbs which belong to failing old age ; 
distress will make the poor provident and cau- 



tious ; and all the good expected from the. at* 
olition of the poor-laws will begin to appear. But 
these expectations will be entirely frustrated, 
and every advantage of Mr. Scarlett's bill de- 
stroyed, by this fatal facility of eluding and repealing 
it. 

The danger of insurrection is a circumstance worthy 
of the most serious consideration, in discussing the 
propriety of a maximum. Mr. Scarlett's bill is an in- 
fallible receipt for tumult and agitation, whenever 
corn is a little dearer than common, ' Repeal the max- 
imum,' will be the clamour in every village ; and woe 
be to those members of the village vestry who should 
oppose the measure. Whether it was really a year of 
scarcity, and whether it was a proper season for ex- 
panding the bounty of the law, would be a question 
constantly and fiercely agitated between the farmers 
and the poor. If the maximum is to be quietly sub- 
mitted to, its repeal must be rendered impossible but 
to the legislature. ( Burn your ships, Mr. Scarlett. — 
You are doing a wise and necessary thing; don't be 
afraid of yourself. Respect your own nest. Don't let 
clause A repeal clause B. Be stout. Take care that 
the rat lawyers ou the treasury bench do not take the 
oysters out of your bill, and leave you the shell. Do 
not yield one particle of the wisdom and philosophy 
of your measure to the country gentlemen of the 
earth.' 

We object to a maximum which is not rendered a 
decreasing maximum. If definite sums were fixed for 
each village, which they could not exceed, that sum 
would, hi a very few years, become a minimum, and an 
established claim. If 80s. were the sum allotted for 
a particular hamlet, the poor would very soon come to 
imagine that they were entitled to that precise sum, — 
and the farmers that they were compelled to give it. — 
Any maximum established should be a decreasing, but 
a very slowly decreasing maximum, — perhaps it should 
not decrease at a greater rate than IOs. per cent, per 
annum. 

It may be doubtful, also, whether the first bill should 
aim at repealing more than 20 per cent, of the present 
amount of the poor-rates. This would be effected in 
forty years. Long before that time, the good or bad 
effects of the measure would be fairly estimated ; if it 
is wise that it should proceed, let posterity do the rest. 
It is by no means necessary to destroy, in one mo- 
ment, upon paper, a payment which cannot, without 
violating every principle of justice, and every conside- 
ration of safety and humanity, be extinguished in less 
than two centuries. 

It is important for Mr. Scarlett to consider whether 
he will make the operation ol his bill immediate, or 
interpose two or three years between its enactment 
and first operation. 

We entirely object to the following clause ; the 
whole of which ought to be expunged : — 

• And be it further enacted that it shall not be lawful for any 
church-warden, overseer, or guardian of the poor, or any 
other person having authority to administer relief to the poor, 
to allow or give, or for any justice of the peace to order, any 
relief to any person whatsoever, who shall be married after the 
passing of this act, for himself, herself, or any part of his or 
her family, unless such poor person shall be actually, at the 
time of asking such relief, by reason of age, sickness, or 
bodily infirmity, unable to obtain a livelihood, and to sup- 
port his or her family by work: Provided always, that no- 
thing in this clause contained shall be construed so as to 
authorize the granting relief, or making any order for re- 
lief, in cases where the same was not lawful before the pas- 
sing of this act' 

Nothing in the whole bill will occasion so much 
abuse and misrepresentation as this clause. It is 
upon this that the radicals will first fasten. It will, 
of course, be explained into a prohibition of marriage 
to the poor ; and will, in fact, create a marked dis- 
tinction between two classes of paupers, and become 
a rallying point for insurrection. In fact, it is whoUy 
unnecessary. As the funds for the relief of pauperism 
decrease, under the operation of a diminishing maxi- 
mum, the first to whom relief is refused will be the 
young and the strong ; in other words, the most absurd 
and extravagant consequences of the present poor- 
laws will be the first cured. 



MEMOIRS OF CAPTAIN ROCK. 



Such, then, is our conception of the bill which ought 
to be brought into Parliament — a maximum regulated 
by the greatest amount of poor-rates ever paid, and 
annually diminishing at the rate of 10*. per cent, till 
they are reduced 20 per cent, of their present value ; 
with such a preamble to the bill as will make it fair 
and consistent for any future Parliament to continue 
the reduction. If Mr. Scarlett will bring in a short 
and simple bill to this effect, and not mingle with it 
any other parochial improvements, and Avill persevere 
in such a bill for two or three years, we believe he will 
carry it ; and we are certain he will confer, by such a 
measure, a lasting benefit upon his country — and upon 
none more than upon its labouring poor. 

We presume there are very few persons who will 
imagine such a measure to be deficient in vigour. 
That the poor-laws should be stopped in their fatal 
encroachment upon property, and unhappy multiplica- 
tion of the human species — and not only this, but that 
the evil should be put in a state of diminution, would 
be an improvement of our condition almost beyond 
hope. The tendency of fears and objections will all 
lie the other way ; and a bill of this nature will not be 
accused of inertness, but of rashness, cruelty, and 
innovation. We cannot now euter into the question 
of the poor-laws, of all others that which has under- 
gone the most frequent and earnest discussion. Our 
whole reasoning is founded upon the assumption, that 
no system of laws was ever so completely calculated 
to destroy industry, foresight, and economy in the 
poor; to extinguish compassion in the rich; and, by 
destroying the balance between the demand for, and 
supply of, labour, to spread a degraded population 
over a ruined land. Not to attempt the cure of this 
evil, would be criminal indolence ; not to cure it gra- 
dually and compassionately, would be very wicked. 
To Mr. Scarlett belongs the real merit of introducing 
the bill. He will forgive us the freedom, perhaps the 
severity, of some of our remarks. We are sometimes 
not quite so smooth as we ought to be ; but we hold 
Mr. Scarlett in very high honour aud estimation. He 
is_ the greatest advocate, perhaps, of his time ; and 
without the slightest symptom of tail or whiskers — 
decorations, it is reported, now as characteristic of the 
English bar as wigs and gowns in days of old — he has 
never carried his soul to the treasury, and said, What 
will you give me for this? — he has never sold the 
warm feelings and honourable motives of his youth 
and manhood for an annual sum of money and an 
office — he has never taken a price for public liberty 
and public happiness — he has never touched the poli- 
tical Aceldama, and signed the devil's bond for cursing 
to-morrow what he has blessed to-day. Living in the 
midst of men who have disgraced it, he has cast 
honour upon his honourable profession; and has 
sought dignity, not from the ermine and the mace, but 
from a straight path and a spotless life. 



MEMOIRS OF CAPTAIN ROCK. (Edinburgh 
Review, 1824.) 

Memoirs of Captain Rock, the celebrated Irish Chieftain, with 
some Account of his Ancestors. Written by himself. Fourth 
Edition. 12mo. London, 1824. 

This agreeable and witty book is generally suppos- 
ed to have been written by Mr. Thomas Moore, a gen- 
tleman of small stature, but full of genius, and a stea- 
dy friend of all that is honourable and just. He has 
here borrowed the name of a celebrated Irish leader, 
to typify that spirit of violence and insurrection which 
is necessarily generated by systematic oppression, and 
rudely avenges its crimes ; and the picture he has 
drawn of its prevalence in that unhappy country is at 
once piteous and frightful. Its effect in exciting hor- 
ror and indignation is in the long run increased, we 
think, — though at first it may seem counteracted, by 
the tone of levity, and even jocularity, under which he 
has chosen to veil the deep sarcasm and substantial 
terrors of his story. We smile at first, and are amus- 
ed — and wond ":r, as we proceed, that the humourous 



narrative should produce conviction and pity — shame, 
abhorrence, and despair ! 

England seems to have treated Ireland much in the 
same way as Mrs. Brownrigg treated her apprentice 
— for which Mrs. Brownrigg is hanged in the first vo 
lume of the Newgate Calendar. Upon the whole, we 
think the apprentice is better off than the Irishman : 
as Mrs. Brownrigg merely starves and beats her, 
without any attempt to prohibit her from going to 
any shop, or praying at any church, her apprentice 
might select; and once or twice if we remember 
rightly, Brownrigg appears to have felt some compas- 
sion. Not so Old England, who indulges rather in a 
steady baseness, uniform brutality, and unrelenting 
oppression. 

Let us select from this entertaining little book a 
short history of dear Ireland, such as even some pro- 
fligate idle member of the House of Commons, voting 
as his master bids him, may perchance throw his eye 
upon, aud reflect for a moment upon the iniquity to 
which he lends his support. 

For some centuries after the reign of Henry II, the 
Irish were killed like game, by persons qualified or 
unqualified. Whether dogs were used does not ap- 
pear quite certain, though it is probable they were, 
spaniels as well as pointers ; and that, after a regular 
point by Basto, well backed by Ponto and Caesar, Mr. 
O'Donnel or Mr. O'Leary bolted from the thicket, and 
were bagged by the English sportsman. With Henry 
II. came in tithes, to which, in all probability, about 
one million of lives may have been sacrificed in Ire- 
land. In the reign of Edward I. the Irish who were 
settled near the English requested that the benefit of 
the English laws might be extended to them ; but the 
remonstrance of the barons with the hesitating king 
was in substance this : — ' You have made us a present 
of these wild gentlemen, and we particularly request 
that no measures may be adopted to check us in that 
full range of tyranny and oppression in which we con- 
sider the value of such a gift to consist. You might 
as well give us sheep, and prevent us from shearing 
the wool, or roasting the meat.' This reasoning pre- 
vailed, and the Irish were kept to their barbarism, 
and the barons preserved their live stock. 

' Read " Orange Faction" (saj'S Captain Rock) here, and you 
have the wisdom of our rulers, at the end of near six centuries, 
in statu quo — The grand periodic year of the stoics, at the 
close of which everything was to begin again, and the same 
events to be all reacted in the same order, is, on a miniature 
scale, represented in the history of the English government in 
Ireland — every succeeding century being but a renewed revo- 
lution of the same follies, the same crimes, and the same tur- 
bulence that disgraced the former. But "Vive l'enemi !'■' say 
I : whoever may suffer by such measures, Captain Rock, at 
least, will prosper. 

' And such was the result at the period of which I am speak- 
ing. The rejection of a petition, so humble and so reasonable, 
was followed, as a matter of course, by one of those daring re- 
bellious into which the revenge of an insulted people naturally 
breaks forth. The M'Cartys, the O'Briens, and all the other 
Macs and O's, who have been kept on the alert by similar 
causes ever since, new to arms under the command of a chief- 
tain of my family ; and as the proffered handle of the sword 
had been rejected, made their inexorable masters at least feel 
its edge' (pp. 23—25,) 

Fifty years afterwards the same request was re- 
newed and refused. Up again rose Mac and O, — a 
just and necessary war ensued ; and after the usual 
murders, the usual chains were replaced upon the 
Irishry. All Irishmen were excluded from every spe- 
cies of office. It was high treason to marry with the 
Irish blood, and highly penal to receive the Irish into 
religious houses. War was waged also against their 
Thomas Moores, Samuel Rogerses, and Walter Scows, 
who went about the country harping and singing 
against English oppression. No such turbulent guests 
were to be received. The plan of making them poets- 
laureate, or converting them to loyalty by pensions of 
£100 per annum, had not been thought of. They de- 
barred the Irish even from the pleasure of running 
away, and fixed them to the soil like negroes. 

' I have thus selected,' says the historian of Rock, ' cursorily 
and at random a few features of the reigns preceding the Re 
formation, in order to show what good use was made of those 



230 



WORKS OF THE REV. SIDNEY SMITH. 



three or four hundred years in attaching the Irish people to 
their English governors ; and by what a gentle course of al- 
teratives they w°re prepared for the inoculation of a new re- 
ligion, which was now about to be attempted upon them by 
the same skilful and friendly hands. 

' Henry the Seventh appears to have been the first monarch 
to whom it occurred that matters were not managed exactly as 
they ought in this part of his dominions: and we find him — 
with a simplicity which is still fresh and youthful among our 
rulers — expressing his surprise that " his subjects of this land 
should be so prone to faction and rebellion, and that so little 
advantage had been hitherto derived from the acquisitions of 
his predecessors, notwithstanding the fruitfulncss and natural 
advantages of Ireland." — Surprising indeed, that a policy, 
such as we have been describing, should not have converted 
the whole country into a perfect Atalantis of happiness — should 
not have made it like the imaginary island of Sir Thomas 
More, where " iota insula velnt unafamilia est. .'" — most stub- 
born, truly, and ungrateful must that people be, upon whom, 
up to the very hour in which I write, such a long unvarying 
course of penal laws, confiscations, and insurrection acts has 
been tried, without making them in the least degree in love 
witli their rulers. 

1 Heloise tells her tutor Abelard, that the correction which 
lie inflicted upon her only served to increase the ardour of her 
affection for him ; but bayonets and hemp are no such " amorls 
stimuli." One more characteristic anecdote of those times, 
and I have done. At the battle of Knocktow, in the reign of 
Henry VII, when that remarkable man, the Earl of Ki blare, 
assisted by the great O'Neal and other Irish chiefs, gained a 
victory over Clanricardc of Connaught most important to the 
English government, Lord Gormanstown, after the battle, in 
the first insolence of success, said, turning to the Earl of Kil- 
dare, " We have now slaughtered our enemies, but to com- 
plete the good deed, we must proceed yet further, and — cut 
the throats of those Irish of our own party !"* Who can 
wonder that the Rock family were active in those times !' — 
(pp. 33-35.) 

Henry VIII. persisted in all these outrages, and 
aggravated them by insulting the prejudices of the 
people. England is almost the only country in the 
world (even at present) where there is not some 
favourite religious spot, where absurd lies, little bits 
of cloth, feathers, rusty nails, splinters, and other 
invaluable relics, are treasured up, and in defence of 
which the whole population are willing to turn out and 
perish as one man. Such was the shrine of St. Kie- 
ran, the whole treasures of which the satellites of that 
corpulent tyrant turned out into the street, pillaged the 
sacred church of Clonmacnoise, scattered the holy 
nousense of the priests to the winds, and burnt the 
real and venerable crosier of St. Patrick, fresh from 
the silversmith's shop, and formed of the most costly 
materials. Modern princes change the uniform of regi- 
ments ; Henry changed the religion of kingdoms, and 
was determined that the belief of the Irish should 
undergo a radical and Protestant conversion. With 
what success this attempt was made, the present state 
of Ireland is sufficient evidence. 

1 Be not dismayed,' said Elizabeth, on hearing that 
O-Neal meditated some designs against her govern- 
ment ; ' tell my friends, if he arise, it will turn to their 
advantage — there will be estates for those who want. 1 
Soon after this prophetic speech, Minister was de- 
stroyed by famine and the sword, and near 600,000 
acres forfeited to the crown, and distributed among 
Englishmen. Sir Walter Raleigh (the virtuous and 
good) butchered the garrison of Limerick in cold 
blood, after Lord Deputy Gray had selected 700 to be 
hanged. There were, during the reign of Elizabeth, 
three invasions of Ireland by the Spaniards, produced 
principally by the absurd measures of this princess 
tor the reformation of its religion. The Catholic 
clergy, in consequence of these measures, abandoned 
their cures, the churches fell to ruin, and the people 
were left without any means of instruction. Add to 
these circumstances the murder of M'Mahon, the 
imprisonment of M'Toolefand O'Dogherty, and the 

* Leland gives this anecdote on the authority of an Englisn- 
man. 

t There are not a few of the best and most humane English- 
men of the present day, who, when under the influence of fear 
or auger, would think it no great crime to put to death people 
whose names begin with O or Mac. The violent death of 
Smith, Green, or Thompson, would throw the neighbourhood 
into convulsions, and the regular forms would be adhered to- 



kidnapping of O'Donnel— all truly Anglo-Hibernian 
proceedings. The execution of the laws was rendered 
detestable and intolerable by the queen's officers of 
justice. The spirit raised by these transactions, be- 
sides innumerable smaller insurrections, gave rise to 
the great wars of Desmond and Hugh O'Neal ; which, 
after they had worn out the ablest generals, discomfit- 
ed the choicest troops, exhausted the treasure, and 
embarrassed the operations of Elizabeth, were termin- 
ated by the destruction of these two ancient families, 
and by the confiscation of more than half the territo- 
rial surface of the island. The two last years of 
O'Neal's wars cost Elizabeth £140,000 per annum, 
though the whole revenue of England at that period 
fell considerable short of £500,000. Essex, after the 
destruction of Norris, led into Ireland an army of 
above 20,000 men, which was totally batiled and de- 
stroyed by Tyrone, within two years of their lauding. 
Such was thelmportance of Irish rebellious two centu- 
ries before the time in which we live. Sir G. Carew 
attempted to assassinate the Lugan earl, — Mountjoy 
compelled the Irish rebels to massacre each other. 
In the course of a few months, 3,000 men were starved 
to death in Tyrone. Sir Arthur Chichester, Sir Rich- 
ard Manson, and other commanders, saw three child- 
ren feeding on the flesh of their dead mother. Such 
were the golden days of good Queen Bess ! 

By the rebellions of Dogherty in the reign of James 
I., six northern counties were confiscated, amounting 
to 500,000 acres. In the same manner, 64,000 acres 
were confiscated in Athlone. The whole of his confis- 
cations amount to nearly a million acres ; and if Le- 
land means plantation acres, they constitute a twelfth 
of the whole kingdom according to Newenham, and a 
tenth according to Sir W Petty. The most shocking 
and scandalous action in the reign of James, was his 
attack upon the whole property of the province of Con- 
naught, which he would have effected, if he had not 
been bought off by a sum greater than he hoped to 
gain by his iniquity, besides the luxury of confisca- 
tion. The Irish, during the reign of James I., suf- 
fered under the double evils of a licentious soldiery, 
and a religious persecution. 

Charles the First took a bribe of £120,000 from his 
Irish subjects, to grant them what in those days were 
called graces, but in these days would be denominated 
the elements of justice. The money was paid, but the 
graces were never granted. One of these graces is 
curious enough, ' That the clergy were not to be per- 
mitted to keep henceforth any private prisons of their 
own, but delinquents were to be committed to the 
public jails.' The idea of a rector, with his own pri- 
vate jail full of dissenters, is the most ludicrous piece 
of tyranny Ave ever heard of. The troops in the begin- 
ning of Charles's reign were supported by the weekly 
fines levied upon the Catholics for non-attendance 
upon established worship. The Archbishop of Dublin 
went himself, at the head of a file of musketeers, to 
disperse a Catholic congregation in Dublin, — which 
object he effected, after a considerable skirmish with 
the priests. ' The favourite object,' (says Dr. Leland, 
a Protestant clergyman, and dignitary of the Irish 
church) ' of the Irish government and the English 
Parliament, was the utter extermination of all the Ca- 
tholic inhabitants of Ireland.' The great rebellion 
took place in this reign, and Ireland was one scene of 
blood and cruelty and confiscation. 

Cromwell began his career in Irelanjd by massacre- 
ing for five days the garrison ftf Drogheda, to whom 
quarter had been promised. Two millions and a half 
of acres were confiscated. Whole towns were put up 
in lots, and sold. The Catholics were banished from 
three-fourths of the kingdom, and confined to Con- 
naught. After a certain day, every Catholic found out 
of Connaught was to be punished with death. Fleet- 
wood complains peevishly, l that the people do not 
transport readily, 7 — but adds, ' it is doubtless a work in 
which the Lord will appear. 7 ■ Ten thousand Irish were 
sent as recruits to the Spanish army. 



but little would be really thought of the death of anybody 
called O'Dogherty or O'Toole. 



MEMOIRS OF CAPTAIN ROCK. 



231 



* Such was Cromwell's way of settling the affairs of Ireland, 
and if a nation is to be ruined, this method is, perhaps, as good 
as any. It is at least, more humane than the slow lingering 
process of exclusion, disappointment, and degradation, by 
which their hearts are worn out under more specious forms of 
tyranny ; and that talent of despatch which Moliere attributes 
to one of his physicians, is no ordinary merit in a practitioner 
like Cromwell : — " Cest un homme expeditif, qui aime a de- 
pecher ses malades ; et quand on a mourir, sela, se fait avec 
lui le plus vite du monde." A certain military duke, who 
complains that Ireland is but half-conquered, would, no doubt, 
upon an emergency, try his hand in the same line oi practice, 
and, like that u stern hero," Mirmillo, in the Dispensary, 

" While others meanly take whole months to slay, 
Despatch the grateful patient in a day !" 

'Among other amiable enactments against the Catholics at 
this period, the price of five pounds was set on the head of a 
Romish priest — being exactly the same sum offered by the 
same legislators for the head of a wolf. The Athenians, we 
are told, encouraged the destruction of wolves by a similar re- 
ward (five drachmas) ; but it does not appear that these hea- 
thens bought up the heads of priests at the same rate — such 
zeal in the cause of religion being reserved for times of Chris- 
tianity and Protestantism.' — (pp. 97-99.) 

Nothing can show more strongly the light in which 
the Irish were held by Cromwell, than the correspond- 
ence Avith Henry Cromwell, respecting the peopling of 
Jamaica from Ireland. Secretary Thurloe sends to 
Henry, the lord-deputy in Ireland, to inform him, that 
1 a stock of Irish girls, and Irish young men, are want- 
ing for the peopling of Jamaica.' The answer of Hen- 
ry Cromwell is as follows : — ' Concerning the supply of 
young men, although we must use force in taking them 
up, yet it being so much for their own good, and likely to 
be of so great advantage to the public, it is not the 
least doubted but that you may have such a number 
of them as you may think fit to make use of on this 
account. 

' I shall not need repeat any thing respecting the 
girls, not doubting to answer your expectations to the 
full in that ; and I think it might be of like advantage 
to your affairs there, and ours here, if you should think 
fit to send 1500 or 2000 boys to the place above men- 
tioned. }Ve can well spare them ; and who knows but 
that it may be the means of making them Englishmen, 
I mean rather Christians. As for the girls, I suppose 
you will make provisions of clothes, and other accom- 
modations for them.' Upon this, Thurloe informs 
Henry Cromwell, that the council have voted 4000 
girls, and as many boys, to go to Jamaica. 

Every Catholic priest found in Ireland was hanged, 
and five pounds paid to the informer. 

' About the year 1652 and 1653,' says Colonel Law- 
rence in his Interests of Ireland, ' the plague and fa- 
mine had so swept away whole counties, that a man 
might travel twenty or thirty miles and not see a liv- 
ing creature, either manor beast, or bird, — they being 
all dead, or had quitted those desolate places. Our 
soldiers would tell stories of the places where they 
«» v emoke — it was so rare to see either smoke by day, 
or fire or candle by night.' In this manner did the 
Irish live and die under Cromwell suffering by the 
sword, famine, pestilence, and persecution, beholding 
the confiscation of a kingdom and the banishment of a 
race. < So that there perished (says Sir W. Petty) in 
the year 1651, 650,000 human 'beings, whose blood 
somebody must atone for to God and the king ! !' 

In the reign of Charles II., by the Act of Settlement 
four millions and a half of acres were for ever taken 
from the Irish. l This country,' says the Earl of Es- 
sex, lord-lieutenant in 1675, ' has been perpetually rent 
and torn, since his majesty's restoration. I can com- 
pare it to nothing better than the flinging the reward 
on the death of a deer among.the packs of hounds — 
where every one pulls and tears where he can for him- 
self.' All wool grown in Ireland was, by act of Par- 
liament, compelled to be sold to England : and Irish 
cattle were excluded from England. The English, 
however, were pleased to accept 30,000 head of cattle, 
sent as a gift from Ireland to the sufferers in the great 
fire ! — and the first day of the sessions, after this act of 
munificence, the Parliament passed fresh acts of ex- 
clusion against the productions of that country. 



' Among the many anomalous situations in which the Irish 
have been placed, by those " marriage vows, false as di- 
cers' oaths," which bind their country to England, the di- 
lemma in which they found themselves at the Revolution 
was not the least perplexing or cruel.* If they were loyal 
to the king de jure, they were hanged by the king de facto ; 
and if they escaped with life from the king de facto, it was 
but to be plundered and proscribed by the king de jure af- 
terwards. 

" Hac gener atque socer coeant mercede suorum."- Virgil. 
" In a manner so summary, prompt, and high mettled, 
'Twixt father and son-in-law, matters were settled." 

' In fact, most of the outlawries in Ireland were for trea- 
son committed the very day in which the Prince and Prin- 
cess of Orange accepted the crown in the banqueting-house; 
though the news of this event could not possibly have 
reached the other side of the Channel on the same day, and 
the lord-lieutenant of King James, with an army to enforce 
obedience, was at that time in actual possession of the go- 
vernment,— so little was common sense consulted, or the 
mere decency of forms observed by that rapacious spirit, 
which nothing less than the confiscation of the whole island 
could satisfy ; and which having, in the reign of James I. 
and at the restoration, despoiled the natives of no less than 
ten million six hundred and thirty-six thousand eight hun- 
dred and ninety-two acres more, being the amount, altoge- 
ther, (according to Lord Clare's calculation), of the whole 
superficial contents of the island. 

< Thus not only had all Ireland suffered confiscation in 
the course of this century, but no inconsiderable portion of 
it had been twice and even thrice confiscated. Well might 
Lord Clare say," " that the situation of the Irish nation, at 
the revolution, stands unparalleled in the history of the in- 
habited world." '—(pp. 111—113.) 

By the articles of Limerick, the Irish were promised 
the free exercise of their religion ; but from that peri- 
od till the year 1788, every year produced some fresh 
penalty against that religion — some liberty was 
abridged, some right impaired, or some suffering in- 
creased. By acts in King William's reign, they were 
prevented from being solicitors. No Catholic was al- 
lowed to marry a Protestant ; and any Catholic who 
sent a son to Catholic countries for education was to 
forfeit all his lands. In the reign of Queen Anne, any 
son of a Catholic who chose to turn Protestant got 
possession of his father's estate. No Papist was al- 
lowed to purchase freehold property, or to take a 
lease for more than thirty years. If a Protestant dies 
intestate, the estate is to go to the next Protestant heir, 
though all to the tenth generation should be Catholic. 
In" the same manner, if a Catholic dies intestate, his 
estate is to go to the next Protestant. No Papist is 
to dwell in Limerick or Galway. No Papist is to take 
an annuity for life. The widow of a Papist turning 
Protestant to have a portion of the chattels of deceased 
in spite of any will. Every Papist teaching schools to 
be presented as a regular Popish convict. Prices of 
catching Catholic priests from 50s. to £10, according 
to rank. Papists are to answer all questions respecting 
other Papists, or to be committed to jail for twelve 
months. No trust to be undertaken for Papists. No 
Papist to be on grand juries. Some notion may be 
formed of the spirit of those times, from an order of 
the House of Commons, ' that the sergeant-at-arms 
should take into custody all Papists that should pre- 
sume to come into the gallery !' {Commons^ Journal, 
vol iu. tol. 976.) During this reign, the English Par- 
liament legislated as absolutely for Ireland as they 
do now for Rutlandshire — an evil not to be complain- 
ed of, if they had done it as justly. In the reign of 
George I. the horses of Papists were seized for the 
militia, and rode by Protestants ; towards which the 
Catholics paid double, and were compelled to find Pro- 
testant substitutes. They were prohibited from voting 
or being high or petty constables. An act of the Eng 
lish Parliament hi this reign opens as follows: — 

* 'Among the persons most puzzled and perplexed by the 
two opposite royal claims on their allegiance, were the cler- 
gymen of the established church ; who having first prayed 
for King James as their lawful sovereign, as soon as Wil- 
liam was proclaimed took to praying for him ; but again, on 
the success of the Jacobite forces in the North, very pru- 
dently prayed for King James once more, till the arrival of 
Schomberg, when, as far as his quarters reached, they re- 
turned to praying for King William again.' 



WORKS OF THE REV. SIDNEY SMITH. 



1 Whereas attempts have been lately made to shake 
off the subjection of Ireland to the Imperial crown of 
these realms, be it enacted/ &c. &c. In the reign of 
George II. four-sixths of the population were cut off 
from the rights of voting at elections, by the necessity 
under which they were placed of taking the oath of 
supremacy. Barristers and solicitors marrying Catho- 
lics are exposed to all the penalties of Catholics. Per- 
sons robbed by privateers during a war with a Catho- 
olic state, are to be indemnified by a levy on the Ca- 
tholic inhabitants of the neighbourhood. All mar- 
riages between Catholics and Protestants are annulied. 
All Popish priests celebrating them are to be hanged. 
• This system,' (says Arthur Young) < has no other 
tendency than that of driving out of the kingdom all 
the personal wealth of the Catholics, and extinguish- 
ing all their industry within it ! and the face of the 
country, every object which presents itself to travel- 
lers, tell him how effectually this has been done.' — 
Young's Tour in Ireland, vol. ii. p. 48. 

Such is the history of Ireland — for we are now at 
our own times ; and the only remaining question is, 
whether the system of improvement and conciliation 
begun in the reign of George III. shall be pursued, and 
the remaining incapacities of the Catholics removed, 
or all these concessions be made insignificant by an 
adherence to that spirit of proscription which they 
professed to abolish ? Looking to the sense and rea- 
son of the thing, and to the ordinary working of huma- 
nity and justice, when assisted, as they are here, by 
self-interest and worldly policy /it might seem absurd 
to doubt of the result. But looking to the facts and 
persons by which Ave are now surrounded, we are con- 
strained to say that Ave greatly fear that these incapa- 
cities Avill never be removed, till they are removed by 
fear. What else, indeed, can we expect when we see 
them opposed by such enlightened men as Mr. Peel 
— faintly assisted by men of such admirable genius as 
Mr. Canning, — when royal dukes-consider it as a com- 
pliment to the memory ot their fathers to continue this 
miserable system of bigotry and exclusion , — when men 
act ignominiously and contemptibly on this question, 
who do so on no other question, — when almost the only 
persons zealously opposed to this general baseness and 
fatuity are a few Avhigs and revieAvers, or here and 
there a virtuous poet like Mr. Moore ? We repeat 
again, that the measure will never be effected but by 
fear. In the midst of one of our just and necessary 
wars, the Irish Catholics will compel this country to 
grant them a great deal more than they at present re- 
quire, or even contemplate. We regret most severely 
the protraction of the disease, — and the danger of the 
remedy ; — but in this way it is that human affairs are 
carried on ! 

We are sorry we have nothing for which to praise 
administration on the subject of the Catholic question 
— but, it is but justice to say, that they have been very 
zealous and active in detecting fiscal abuses in Ireland, 
in improving mercantile regulations, and in detecting 
Irish jobs. The commission on which Mr. Wallace 
presided has been of the greatest possible utility, and 
does infinite credit to the government. The name of 
Mr. Wallace, in any commission, has now become a 
pledge to the public that there is a real intention to in- 
vestigate and correct abuse. He stands in the singu- 
lar predicament of being equally trusted by the rulers 
and the ruled. It is a new era in government, when 
such men are called into action ; and, if there were j 
not proclaimed and fatal limits to that ministerial lib- 
erality — which, so far as it goes, Ave Avclcome without j 
a grudge, and praise Avithout a sneer — Ave might yet i 
hope that, for the sake of mere consistency, they ! 
might be led to falsify our forebodings. But alas ! j 
there are moti\ r es more immediate, and therefore, ir- 1 
resistible ; and the time is not yet come, when it Avill i 
be believed easier to govern Ireland by the love of the ! 
many thau by the power of the few — Avhen the paltry j 
and dangerous machinery of bigoted fiction and pros- 
tituted patronage may be dispensed Avith, and the ves- i 
sel of the state be propelled by the natural current of j 
popular interests and the breath of popular applause. | 
In the mean time, we cannot resist the temptation of 
gritcing our conclusion with the following beautiful pas- ' 



sage, in which the author alludes to the hopes that 
Avere raised at another great era of partial concession 
and liberality — that of the revolution of 1782, — when, 
also, benefits Avere conferred which proved abortive, 
because they Avere incomplete — and balm poured into 
the wound, where the envenomed shaft was yet left 
to rankle. 

< And here,' says the gallant Captain Rock, — ' as the free 
confession of weaknesses constitutes the chief charm and 
use of biography — I will candidly own that the dawn of 
prosperity and concord, ay hich I now saw breaking over'the 
fortunes of my country, so dazzled and deceived my youth- 
ful eyes, and so unsettled every hereditary notion of what 
I owed to my name and family, that — shall I confess it ?— I 
even hailed with pleasure the prospects of peace and free- 
dom that seemed opening around me ; nay, was ready, in 
the boyish enthusiam of the moment, to sacrifice all my 
own personal interest in all future riots and rebellions, to 
the one bright, seducing object of my country's liberty and 
repose. 

' When I contemplated such a man as the venerable 
Charlemont, Avhose nobility was to the people like a fort 
over a valley — elevated above them solely for their defence; 
who introduced the polish of the courtier into the camp of 
the freeman, and served his country with all that pure, Pla 
tonic deA'otion, which a true knight in the times of chivalry 
profferred to his mistress ; — when I listened to the eloquence 
of Grattan, the very music of freedom— her first, fresh ma- 
tin song, after a long night of slavery, degradation, and 
sorrow ; — Avhen I saw the bright-offerings which he brought 
to the shrine of his country,— wisdom, genius, courage, and 
patience, invigorated and embellished by all those social 
and domestic virtues, without which the loftiest talents stand 
isolated in the moral waste around them, like the pillars of 
Palmyra towering in a wilderness !—- when I reflected on all 
this, it not only disheartened me for the mission of discord 
Avhich I had undertaken, but made me secretly hope that it 
might be rendered unnecessary ; and that a country, which 
could produce such men and achieve such a revolution, 
might yet— in spite of the joint efforts of the government 
and my family — take her rank in the scale of nations, and 
be happy ! 

' My father, however, who saw the momentary dazzle by 
which I was affected, soon drew me out of this false light of 
hope in which I lay basking, and set the truth before me in 
a way but too convincing and ominous. '•' Be not deceived, 
boy," he would say, "by the fallacious appearances before 
you. Eminently great and good as is the man to whom Ire- 
land owes this short era of glory, our work, believe me, will 
last longer than his. We have a power on our side that 
1 will not willingly let us die ;' and, long after Grattan shall 
have disappeared from earth, — like that arrow shot into the 
clouds by Alcestes, effecting nothing, but leaving a long 
train of light behind him, — the family of the Rocks will 
continue to nourish in all their native glory, upheld by the 
ever-watchful care of the legislature, and fostered by that 
'nursing-mother of Liberty,' the Church." ' 



GRANBY. (Edinburgh Review, 1826., 

Granby. Ji Novel, in Three Volumes. London, Colburn, 
* 1S26. 

Theue is nothing more amusing in the spectacles 
of the present day, than to see the Sir Johns and Sir 
Thomases of the'Housc of Commons struck aghast by 
the useful science andAvise novelties of Mr. Huskisson 
and the chancellor of the exchequer. Treason, Dis- 
affection, Atheism, Republicanism, and Socinianism — 
the greatest guns in the Noodle's park of artillery — 
they cannot bring to bear upon these gentlemen. 
Even to charge AAath a regiment of ancestors is not 
quite so efficacious as it used to be ; and all that re- 
mains, therefore, is to rail against Peter M'Cullough 
and political economy ! In the mean time, day after 
day, doAvn goes one piece of nonsense or another. 
The most approved trash, and the most trusty cla- 
mours, are found to be utterly powerless. TAvopenny 
taunts and trumpery truisms have lost their destructive 
omnipotence ; and the exhausted commonplaceman, 
and the afflicted fool, moan over the ashes of imbecil- 
ity, and strew flowers on the urn of ignorance ! Gen- 
eral Elliot found the London tailors in a state of muti- 
ny, and he raised from them a regiment ot light caval- 
ry, which distinguished itself in a very striking man 
ner at the battle of Minden. In humble imitation of 
thi6 example, we shall avail ourselves of the present 



GRAttBY. 



S£3 



political disaffection and unsatisfactory idleness of 
many men of rank and consequence, to request their 
attention to the Novel of Granby — written, as we have 
heard, by a young gentleman ot the name of Lister,* 
and from which we have derived a considerable deal 
of pleasure and entertainment. 

The main question as to a novel is — did it amuse ? 
were you surprised at dinner coming so soon ? did you 
mistake eleven for ten, and twelve for eleven ? were 
you too late for dress ? and did you sit up beyond the 
usual hour ? If a novel produces these effects, it is 
good ; if it does not — story, language, love, scandal it- 
self cannot save it. It is only meant to please ; and 
it must do that, or it does nothing. Now Granby 
seems to us to ,answer this test extremely well ; it pro- 
duces unpunctuality, makes the readers too late for 
dinner, impatient of contradiction, and inattentive, — 
even if a bishop is making an observation, or a gentle- 
man lately from the Pyramids, or the Upper Catar- 
acts, is let loose upon the drawing-room. The objec- 
tion, indeed, to these compositions, when they are 
well done is, that it is impossible to do any thing, or 
perform any human duty, while we are engaged in 
them. Who can read Mr. Hallam's Middle Ages, or 
extract the root of an impossible quantity, or draw up 
a bond, when he is in the middle of Mr. Trebeck and 
Lady Charlotte Duncan? How can the boy's lesson 
be heard, about the Jove-nourished Achilles, or his six 
miserable verses upon Dido be corrected, when Henry 
Granby and Mr. Courtenay are both making love to 
Miss Jermyn ? Common life palls in the middle of 
these artificial scenes. All is emotion when the book 
is open — all dull, flat, and feeble when it is shut. 

Granby, a young man of no profession, living with 
an old uncle in the country, falls in love with Miss Jer- 
myn, and Miss Jermyn with him; but Sir Thomas 
and Lady Jermyn, as the young gentleman is not rich, 
having discovered, by long living in the world and pa- 
tient observation of its ways, that young people are 
commonly Malthus-proof and have children, and that 
young and old must eat, very naturally do what they 
can to discourage the union. The young people, howev- 
er, both go to town — meet at balls — flutter, blush, look 
and cannot speak — speak and cannot look, — suspect, 
misinterpret, are sad and mad, peevish and jealous, 
fond and foolish ; but the passion, after all, seems less 
near to its accomplishment at the end of the season 
than the beginning. The uncle of Granby, however, 
dies, and leaves to his nephew a statement accompa- 
nied with the requisite proofs — that Mr. Tyrrel, the 
supposed son of Lord Malton, is illegitimate, and that 
he, Granby, is the heir to Lord Malton's fortune. The 
second volume is now far advanced, and it is time for 
Lord Malton to die. Accordingly Mr. Lister very ju- 
diciously despatches him ; Granby inherits the estate 
— his virtues (for what shows off virtue like land?) 
are discovered by the Jermyns — and they marry in the 
last act. 

Upon this slender story, the author has succeeded 
in making a very agreeable and interesting novel? and 
he has succeeded, we think, chiefly, by the very easy 
and natural picture of manners, as they really exist 
among the upper classes ; by the description of new 
characters judiciously drawn and faithfully preserved ; 
and by the introduction of many striking and well-man- 
nged incidents ; and we are particularly struck through- 
out the whole with the discretion and good sense of 
the author. He is never nimious ; there is nothing in 
excess ; there is a good deal of fancy and a great deal 
of spirit at work, but a directing and superintending 
judgment rarely quits him. 

i We would instance, as a proof of his tact and talent,, 
[the visit at Lord Daventry's, and the description of 
characters of which the party is composed. There 
are absolutely no events ; nobody runs away, goes 
mad, or dies. There is little of love, or of hatred ; no 
great passion comes into play ; but nothing can be 
farther removed from dulness and insipidity. Who 
has ever lived in the world without often meeting the 
Miss Cliftons ? 

* This is the gentleman who now keeps the keys of Life 
and Death, the Janitor of the world. 



'The Miss Cliftons were good-humoured girls; not hand 
some, but of pleasing manners, and sufficiently clever to keep 
up the ball of conversation very agreeable for an occasional 
half hour. They were always au courant de jour, and knew 
and saw the first of every thing— were in the earliest confi- 
dence of many a bride elect, and could frequently tell that a 
marriage was "off" long before it had been announced as "on 
the tapis " in the morning papers — always knew something of 
the new opera, or the new Scotch novel, before any body else 
did— were the first who made fizgigs, or acted charades— con- 
trived to have private views of most exhibitions, » and were 
supposed to have led the fashionable throng to the Caledonian 
Chapel, Cross Street, Hatton Garden. Their employments 
were like those of most other girls ; they sang, played, drew, 
rode, read occasionally, spoiled much muslin, manufactured 
purses, hand-screens, and reticules for a repository, and 
transcribed a considerable quantity of music out of large fair 
print into diminutive manuscript. 

' Miss Clifton was clever and accomplished; rather cold, 
but very conversable ; collected seals, franks, and anec 
dotes of the day ; and was a great retailer of the latter. 
Anne was odd and entertaining ; was a formidable quizzer, 
and no mean caricaturist ; liked fun in most shapes ; and 
next to making people laugh, had rather they stared at what 
she said. Maria was the echo of the other two ; vouched 
for all Miss Clifton's anecdotes, and led the laugh at Anne's 
repartees. They were plain, and they knew it ; and cared 
less about it than young ladies usually do. Their plainness, 
however, would have been less striking, but foi that hard, 
pale, par-boiled town look — that stamp of fashion, with 
which late hours and hot rooms generally endow the fe- 
male face.'— (pp. 103—105.) 

Having introduced our reader to the Miss Cliftons, 
we must make him acquainted with Mr. Trebeck, one 
of those universally appearing gentlemen and tremen- 
dous table tyrants, by whom London society is so fre- 
quently governed ; — 

'Mr. Trebeck had great powers of entertainment, and a 
keen and lively turn for satire ; and could talk down his supe- 
riors, whether in rank or talent, with very imposing confi- 
dence. He saw the advantages of being formidable, and ob- 
served with derision how those whose malignity he pampered 
with ridicule of others, vainly thought to purchase by subser- 
viency exemption for themselves. He had sounded the gulli- 
bility of the world ; knew the precise current value of preten- 
sion ; and soon found himself the acknowledged umpire, the 
last appeal, of many contented followers. 

' He seldom committed himself by praise or recommenda 
tion, but rather left his example and adoption to work its way. 
As for censure, he bad both ample and witty store ; but here, 
too, he often husbanded his remarks, and where it was need- 
less or dangerous to define a fault, could check admiration by 
an incredulous smile, and depress pretensions of a season's 
standing by the raising of an eyebrow. He had a quick per- 
ception of the foibles of others, and a keen relish for banter- 
ing and exposing them. No keeper of a menagerie could bet- 
ter show off a monkey than he could an " original." He could 
ingeniously cause the unconscious subject to place his own 
absurdities in the best point of view, and would cloak his 
derision under the blandest cajolery. Imitators he loved 
much ; but to baffle them — more. He loved to turn upon the 
luckless adopters of his last folly, and see them precipitately 
back out of the scrape into which himself had led them. 

'In the art of cutting he shone unrivalled: he knew the 
"when," the "where," and the "how." Without affecting 
useless short-sightedness, he could assume that calm but wan- 
dering gaze, which veers, as if unconsciously, round the pro- 
scribed individual ; neither fixing, nor to be fixed; not looking 
on vacancy, nor on any one object ; neither occupied nor ab- 
stracted; a look which perhaps excuses you to the person cut, 
and at any rate, prevents him from accosting you. Originality 
was his idol. He wished to astonish, even if he did not amuse; 
and had rather say a sly thing than a commonplace one. He 
was led by this sometimes even to approach the verge of rude- 
ness and vulgarity; but he had considerable tact, and a happy 
hardihood, which generally carried him through the difficulties 
into which his fearless love of originality brought him. In« 
deed, he well knew that what would, in the present condition of 
his reputation, be scouted in any body else, would pass cur- 
rent with the world in him. Such was the far-famed and re- 
doubtable Trebeck.'— (pp. 109—112.) 

This sketch we think exceedingly clever. But we 
are not sure that its merit is fully sustained by the ac- 
tual presentment of its subject. He makes his debut 
at dinner very characteristically, by gliding in quietl; 
after it is half over ; but in the dialogue which follows 
with Miss Jermyn, he seems to us a little too resolute 
ly witty, and somewhat affectedly odd — though the 
whole scene is executed with spirit and talent. 



234 



WORKS 0* THE REV. SIDNEY SMITH. 



< The duke had been discoursing on cookery, when Mr. Tre- 
beck turned to her, and asked in a low tone if she had ever 
met the duke before — "I assure you," said he, " that upon that 
subject he is well worth attending to. He is supposed to pos- 
sess more true science than any amateur of his day. By the 
bye, what is the dish before you ? It looks well, and I see you 
are eating some of it. Let me recommend it to him upon your 
authority ; I dare not upon my own." — " Then pray do not use 
mine." — " Yes, I will, with your permission ; I'll tell him you 
thought, by what dropped from him in conversation, that it 
would suit the genius of his taste. Shall I? Yes. — Duke," 
(raising his voice a little, and speaking across the table), — 
"Oh, no ! how can you ? " — " Why not ? — Duke," (with a glance 
at Caroline), " will you allow me to take wine with you ? " — 
" I thought," said she, relieved from her trepidation, and laugh- 
ing slightly, "you would never say anything so very strange." 
— "You have too good an opinion of me; I blush for my un- 
worthiness. But confess, that in fact you were rather alarmed 
at the idea of being held up to such a critic as the recom- 
mender of a bad dish."—" Oh, no, I was not thinking of that ; 
but I hardly know the duke : and it would have seemed so 
odd; aud perhaps he might have thought that I had really 
told you to say something of that kind." — " Of course he would ; 
but you must not suppose that he would have been at all sur- 
prised at it. I'm afraid you are not aware of the full ex- 
tent of your privileges, and are not conscious how many 
things young ladies can, and may, and will do."—" Indeed I 
am not — perhaps you will instruct me." — "Ah, I never do that 
for any body. I like to see young ladies instruct themselves. 
It is better for them, and much more amusing to me. But, 
however, for once I will venture to tell you, that a very com- 
petent knowledge of the duties of women may, with proper 
attention, be picked up in a ball room."—" Then I hope," said 
she, laughing. " you will attribute my deficiency to my little 
experience of balls. I have only been at two." — "Only two! 
and one of them I suppose a race ball. Then you have not 
yet experienced any of the pleasures of a London season? 
Never had the dear delight of seeing and being seen, in a well 
of tall people at a rout, or passed a pleasant hour at a ball 
upon a staircase ? I envy you. You have much to enjoy." 
— "You do not mean that I really have?" — "Yes, really. But 
let me give you a caution or two. Never dance with any man 
without first knowing his character and condition, on the word 
of two credible chaperons. At balls, too, consider what you 
come for — to dance of course, and not to converse; therefore, 
never t. ilk yourself, nor encourage it in others." — "I'm afraid 
I can only answer for myself." — "Why, if foolish, well-mean- 
ing people will choose to be entertaining, I question if you 
have the power of frowning them down in a very forbidding 
manner ; but I would give them no countenance nevertheless." 
— "Your advice seems a little ironical." — "Oh, you may either 
follow it or reverse it — that is its chief beauty. It is equally 
good either way." — After a slight pause, he continued — "I 
hope you do not sing, or play, or draw, or do any thing that 
every body else does." — "I am obliged *to confess that I do a 
little — very little — in each." — "I understand your 'very little:' 
I'm afraid you are accomplished." — "You need have no fear of 
that. But why are you an enemy to all accomplishments?" — 
'All accomplishments? Nay, surely you do not think me an 
enemy to all ? What can you possibly take me for ? " — " I do 
not know," said she, laughing slightly. — "Yes, I see you do 
not know exactly what to make of me — and you are not without 
your apprehensions. I can perceive that, though you try to 
conceal them. — But never mind. I am a safe person to sit near 
— sometimes. I am to-day. This is one of my lucid intervals. 
I'm much better, thanks to my keeper. There he is, on the 
other side of the table — the tall man in black," (pointing out 
Mr. Bennet), " a highly respectable kind of person. I came 
with him here for change of air. How do you think I look at 
present?" — Caroline could not answer him for laughing. — 
"Nay," said he, "it is cruel to laugh on such a subject. It is 
very hard that you should do that, and misrepresent my mean- 
ing too." — "Well then," said Caroline, resuming a respectable 
portion of gravity; "that I may not be guilty of that again, 
what accomplishments do you allow to be tolerable?" — "Let 
me see," said he, with a look of consideration : you may play a 
waltz with one hand, and dance as little as you think conve- 
nient. You may draw caricatures of your intimate friends, 
you may not sing a note of Rossini; nor sketch gateposts and 
donkey.'- after nature. You may sit to a harp, but you need 
not play it. You must not paint miniatures nor copy Swiss 
costumes. But you may manufacture any thing — from a cap 
down to a pair of shoes — always remembering that the less 
useful your work the better. Can you remember all this?" — 
"I do not know," said she, "it comprehends so much; and I 
am rath r puzzled between the 'mays' and the 'mustnots.' 
However, it seems, according to your code, that very little is 
to be required of me; for you have not mentioned any thing 
that I \: Ksitively must do." — "Ah, well, I can reduce all to a 
very sin 11 compass You must be an archeress in the summer, 
and a skater in the winter, arid play well at billiards all the 
year; aid if you do these extremely well, my admiration will 
have no bounds."— " I Relieve I must forfeit all claim to your 
admiration then, for unfortunately I am not so gifted."—" Then 



you must place it to the account of your other jriifts." — "Cer- 
tainly — when it comes." — '• Oh it is sure to come, as you well 
know : but, nevertheless, I like that incredulous look extreme- 
ly." — He then turned away, thinking probably that he had 
paid her the compliment of sufficient attention, and began a 
conversation with the duchess, which was carried on in such a 
well-regulated under tone, as to be perfectly inaudible to any 
but themselves.— (pp. 92—99.) 

The bustling importance of Sir Thomas Jermyn, the 
fat duke and his right hand man, the blunt toad-eater, 
Mr. Charlecote, a loud noisy sportsman, and Lady 
Jermyn's worldly prudence, are all displayed and 
managed with considerable skill and great power of 
amusing. One little sin against good taste, our author 
sometimes commits — an error from which Sir Walter 
Scott is not exempt. We mean the humour of giving 
characteristic names to persons and places; for in- 
stance, Sir Thomas Jermyn is Member of Parliament 
for the town of Rottenborough. This very easy and 
appellative jocularity seems to us, we confess, to 
savour a little of vulgarity ; and is therefore quite as 
unworthy of Mr. Lister, as Dr. Dryasdust is of Sir 
Walter Scott. The plainest names which can be 
found (Smith, Thomson, Johnson, and Simson, al- 
ways excepted), are the best for novels. Lord Ches- 
terton we have often met with ; and suffered a good 
deal from his lordship : a heavy, pompous, meddling 
peer, occupying a great share of the conversation — 
saying things in ten words which required only two, 
and evidently convinced that he is making a great im- 
pression; a large man, with a large head, and very 
landed manner ; knowing enough to torment his fel- 
low-creatures, not to instruct them — the ridicule of 
young ladies, and the natural butt and target of wit. 
It is easy to talk of carnivorous animals and beasts of 
prey ; but does such a man, who lays waste a whole 
party of civilized beings by prosing, reflect upon the 
joy he spoils, and the misery he creates, in the course 
of his life ? and that any one who listens to him 
through politeness, would prefer toothache or earache 
to his conversation ? Does he consider the extreme 
uneasiness which ensues, when the company have dis- 
covered a man to be an extremely absurd person, at 
the same time that it is absolutely impossible to con- 
vey, by words or manner, the most distant suspicion 
of the discovery? And then, who punishes this bore ? 
What sessions and what assizes for him ? What bill 
is found against him ? Who indicts him ? When the 
judges have gone their vernal and autumnal rounds — 
the sheep-stealer disappears — the swindler gets ready 
for the Bay — the solid parts of the murderer are pre- 
served in anatomical collections. But, after twenty 
years of crime, the bore is discovered in the same 
house, in the same attitude, eating the same soup, — 
unpunished, untried, undissected — no scaffold, no skel- 
eton — no mob of gentlemen and ladies to gape overt 
his last dying speech and confession. 

The scene of quizzing the country neighbours is^ 
well imagined, and not ill executed ; though there are 
many more fortunate passages in the book. The el- 
derly widows of the metropolis beg, through us, to 
return their thanks to Mr. Lister for the following 
agreeable portrait of Mrs. Dormer. 

'It would be difficult to find a more pleasing example than: 
Mrs. Dormer, of that much libelled class of elderly ladies of i 
the world, who are presumed to be happy only at the card ta-t 
ble ; to grow in bitterness as they advanced in years, and to< 
haunt, like restless ghosts, those busy circles which they no> 
longer either enliven or adorn. Such there maybe; but of i 
these she was not one. She was the frequenter of society, but 
not its slave. She had great natural benevolence of disposi-' 
tion ; a friendly vivacity of manners, which endeared her to 
the young, and a steady good sense, which commanded the re- 
spect of her contemporaries; and many, who did not agree 
with her on particular points, were willing to allow that there 
was a good deal of reason in Mrs. Dormer's prejudices. She 
was, perhaps, a little blind to the faults of her friends; a de- 
fect of which the world could not cure her; but she was very 
kind to their virtues. She was fond of young people, and hac 
an unimpaired gaiety about her, which seemed to expand ii 
the contact with them ; and she was anxious to promote, foi 
their sake, even those amusements for which she had lost al 
taste herself. She was — but after all, she will be best describee 
by negatives. She was not a match-maker, or mischief-maker 
nor did she plume herself upon her charity, in implicitly be 



GRANBY. 



licving only just half of what the world says. She was no re- 
tailer of scandalous " on dits." She did not combat wrinkles 
with rouge ; nor did she labour to render years less respected 
by a miserable affectation of girlish fashions. She did not stickle 
for the inviolable exclusiveness of certain sects ; nor was she 
afraid of being lyiown to visit a friend in an unfashionable 
quarter of the town. She was no worshipper of mere rank. 
She did not patronize oddities ; nor sanction those who delight 
in braying the rules of common decency. She did not evince 
her sense of propriety, by shaking hands with the recent de- 
fendant in a crim. con. cause ; nor exhale her devotion in Sun- 
day routs.'— (pp. 243, 244.) 

Mrs. Clotworthy, we are afraid, will not be quite 
so well pleased with the description of her rout. Mrs. 
Clotworthy is one of those ladies who have ices, fid- 
dlers, and fine rooms, but no fine friends. But fine 
friends may always be had, where there are ices, fid- 
dlers, and fine rooms : and so, with ten or a dozen 
stars and an Oonalaska chief ; and, followed by all 
vicious and salient London, Mrs. Clotworthy takes the 
field. 

« The poor woman seemed half dead with fatigue already ; 
and we cannot venture to say whether the prospect of five 
hours more of this high wrought enjoyment tended much to 
brace her to the task. It was a brilliant sight, and an interest- 
ing one, if it could have been viewed from some fair vantage 
ground, with ample space, in coolness and in quiet. Rank, 
beauty, and splendour, were richly blended. The gay attire ; 
the glittering jewels; the more resplendent features they 
adorned, and too frequently the rouged cheek of the sexagen- 
arian : the vigilant chaperon ; the fair but languid form which 
she conducted ; well curled heads, well propped with starch ; 
well whiskered guards-men ; and here and there fat good- 
humoured elderly gentlemen, with stars upon their coats; — all 
these united in one close medley — a curious piece of living 
mosaic. Most of them came to see and be seen ; some of the 
most youthful professedly to dance ; yet how could they 1 at 
any rate they tried.— They stood, if they could, with their vis- 
ri-vis facing them, — and sidled across — and back again and 
made one step,— or two if there was room, to the right or left, 
and joined hands, and set — perhaps, and turned their partners, 
or dispensed with it if necessary— and so on to the end of " La 
Finale ;" and then comes a waltz for the few who choose it — 
and then another squeezy quadrille — and so on— and on, till 
the weary many " leave ample room and verge enough" for the 
persevering few to figure in with greater freedom. 

" But then they talk ; oh ! ay ! true, we must not forget the 
charms of conversation. And what passes between nine-tenths 
of them! Remarks on the heat of the room; the state of the 
crowd : the impossibility of dancing, and the propriety never- 
theless of attempting it ; that on last Wednesday was a bad 
Almack's, and on Thursday a worse Opera ; that the new bal- 
let is supposed to be good ; mutual inquiries how they like 
Pasta, or Catalani, or whoever the syren of the day may be ; 
whether they have been at Lady A.'s, and whether they are 
going to Mrs. B.'s ; whether they think Miss Such-a-one hand- 
some ! and what is the name of the gentleman talking to her ; 
whether Rossini's music makes the best quadrilles, and whethej 
Collinet's band are the best to play them. There are many 
who pay in better coin ; but the small change is much of this 
description.'— (I. 249—251.) 

We consider the following description of London, 
as it appears to a person walking home after a rout, 
at four or five o'clock in the morning, to be as poeti- 
cal as any thing written on the forests of Guiana, or 
the falls of Niagara : — 

< Granby followed them with his eyes ; and now, too full 
of happiness to be accessible to any feelings of jealousy or 
repining, after a short reverie of the purest satisfaction, he 
left the ball, and sallied out into the fresh cool air of a sum- 
mer morning — suddenly passing from the red glare of lamp- 
light, to the clear sober brightness of returning day. He 
walked cheerfully onward, refreshed and exhilirated by the 
air of morning, and interested with the scene around him. 
It was broad day-light, and he viewed the town under an 
aspect in which it is alike presented to the late retiring vo- 
tary of pleasure, and the early rising sons of business. He 
stopped on the pavement of Oxford Street, to contemplate 
the effect. The whole extent of that long vista, unclouded 
by the mid-day smoke, was distinctly visible to his eye at 
once. The houses shrunk to half their span, while the few 
visible spires of the adjacent churches seemed to rise less 
distant than before, gaily tipped with early sunshine, and 
much diminished in apparent size, but heightened in dis- 
tinctness and in beauty. Had it not been for the cool gray 
tint which slightly mingled with every object, the brightness 
iwas almost that of noon. But the life, the bustle, the busy 
din, the flowing tide ot human existence, were all wanting 
to complete the similitude. All was hushed and silent ; and 
Ithis mighty receptacle of human beings, which a few short 



hours would awake into active energy and motion, seemed 
like a city of the dead. 

* There was little to break this solemn illusion. Aroufid 
were the monuments of human exertion, but the hands 
which formed them were no longer there. Few, if any, 
were the symptoms of life. No sounds were heard but the 
heavy creaking of a solitary waggon ; the twittering of an 
occasional sparrow ; the monotonous tone of the drowsy 
watchman ; and the distant rattle of the retiring carriage, 
fading on the ear till it melted into silence : and the eye that 
searched for living objects fell on nothing but the grim 
great-coated guardian of the night, muffled up into an ap- 
pearance of doubtful character between bear and man, and 
scarcely distinguishable, by the colour of his dress, from the 
brown flags along which he sauntered.' — pp. 297 — 299.) 

One of the most prominent characters of the book, 
and the best drawn, is that of Tyrrel, son of Lord 
Malton, a noble blackleg, a titled gamester, and a 
profound plotting villain — a man, in comparison of 
whom, nine-tenths of the persons hung in Newgate 
are pure and perfect. The profound dissimulation 
and wicked artifices of this diabolical person are 
painted with great energy and power of description. 
The party at whist made to take in Granby is very 
good, and that part of the story where Granby com- 
pels Tyrrel to refund what he has won of Courtenay 
is of first-rate dramatic excellence ; and if any one 
wishes for a short and convincing proof of the powers 
of the writer of this novel — to that scene we refer him. 
It shall be the taster of the cheese, and we are con- 
vinced it will sell the whole article. We are so much 
struck with it, that we advise the author to consider 
seriously whether he could not write a good play. It 
is many years since a good play has been written. It 
is about time, judging from the common economy of 
nature, that a good dramatic writer should appear. 
We promise Mr. Lister sincerely, that the Edinburgh 
Review shall rapidly undeceive him if he mistakes his 
talents; and that his delusion shall not last beyond 
the first tragedy or comedy. 

The picture at the exhibition is extremely well 
managed, and all the various love-tricks of attempting 
to appear indifferent, are ; as well as we can remem- 
ber, from the life. But it is thirty or forty years since 
we have been in love. 

The horror of an affectionate and dexterous mamma 
is a handsome young man without money : and the 
following lecture deserves to be committed to memory 
by all managing mothers, and repeated at proper in- 
tervals to the female progeny. 

' " True, my love, but understand me. I don't wish you 
positively to avoid him. I would not go away, for instance, 
if I saw him coming, or even turn my head that I might not 
see him as he passed. That would be too broad and mark- 
ed. People might notice it. It would look particular. We 
should never do anything that looks particular. No, I 
would answer him civilly and composedly whenever he 
spoke to me, and then pass on, just as you might in the 
case of anybody else. But I leave all this to your own tact 
and discretion, of which nobody has more for her age. I 
am sure you can enter into all these niceties, and that my 
observations will not be lost upon you. And now, my love, 
let me mention another thing. You must get over that 
little embarrassment which I see you show whenever you 
meet him. It was very natural and excusable the first 
time, considering our long acquaintance with him and the 
General ; but we must make our conduct conform to cir- 
cumstances ; so try to get the better of this little flutter ; it 
does not look well, and might be observed. There is no 
quality more valuable in a young person than self-posses- 
sion. So you must keep down these blushes," said she, 
patting her on the cheek, " or I believe I must rouge you: — 
though it would be a thousand pities, with the pretty na- 
tural colour you have. But you must remember what I 
have been saying. Be more composed in your behaviour. 
Try to adopt the manner which I do. It may be difficult ; 
but you see I contrive it, and I have known Mr. Granby a 
great deal longer than you have, Caroline." '—(pp. 21, 
22.) 

These principles are of the highest practical impor- 
tance in an age when the art of marrying daughters is 
carried to the highest pitch of excellence, when love 
must be made to the young men of fortune, not only 
by the young lady who must appear to be dying for 
him, but by the father, mother, aunts, cousins, tutor, 
gamekeeper, and stable-boy— assisted by the parson 



236 



WORKS OF THE REV. SIDNEY SMITH. 



of the parish, and the church- wardens. If any of 
these fail, Dives pouts, and the match is off. 

The merit of this writer is, that he catches delicate 
portraits, which a less skilful artist would pass over,< 
from not thinking the features sufficiently marked. 
We are struck, however, with the resemblance, and 
are pleased with the conquest of difficulties — we re- 
member to have seen such faces, and are sensible tbat 
they form an agreeable variety to the expression of 
more marked and decided character. Nobody, for in- 
stance, can deny that he is acquainted with Miss 
Darrell. 

* Miss Darrell was not strictly a beauty. She bad not, as 
was frequently observed by her female friends, and unwil- 
lingly admitted by her male admirers, a single truly good 
feature in her face. But who could quarrel with the tout 
ensemble 1 who but must be dazzled with the graceful ani- 
mation with which those features were lighted up ? Let 
critics hesitate to pronounce her beautiful ; at any rate they 
must allow her to be fascinating. Place a perfect stranger 
in a crowded assembly, and she would first attract his eye ; 
correcter beauties would pass unnoticed, and his first atten- 
tion would be riveted by her. She was all brilliancy and 
effect ; but it was hard to say she studied it ; so little did her 
spontaneous, airy graces convey the impression of preme- 
ditated practice. She was a sparkling tissue of little affec- 
tations, which, however, appeared so interwoven with her- 
self, that their seeming artlessness disarmed one's censure. 
Strip them away, and you destroyed at once the brilliant 
being that so much attracted you ; and thus it became diffi- 
cult to condemn what you felt unable, and, indeed, unwil- 
ling, to remove. With positive affectation, malevolence it- 
self could rarely charge her ; and prudish censure seldom 
exceeded the guarded limits of a dry remark, that Miss Dar- 
rell had " a good deal of manner." 

« Eclat she sought and gained. Indeed, she was both 
formed to gain it and disposed to desire it. But she requir- 
ed an extensive sphere. A ball-room was her true arena : 
for she waltzed " a ravir," and could talk enchantingly 
about nothing. She was devoted to fashion, and all its 
fickleness, and went to the extreme whenever she could do 
so consistently with grace. But she aspired to be a leader 
as well as a follower ; seldom, if ever, adopted a mode that 
was unbecoming to herself, and dressed to suit the genius 
of her face.'— (pp. 28, 29.) 

Tremendous is the power of a novelist ! If four or 
five men are in a room, and show a disposition to 
break the peace, no human magistrate (not even Mr. 
Justice Bayley) could do more than bind them over 
to keep the peace, and commit them if they refused. 
But the writer of the novel stands with a pen in his 
hand, and can run any of them through the body,— 
can knock down any one individual, and keep the 
others upon their legs ; or, like the last scene in the 
first tragedy written by a young man of genius, can 
put them all to death. Now, an author possessing 
such extraordinary privileges, should not have allowed 
Mr. Tyrrel to strike Granby. This is ill managed; 
particularly as Granby does not return the blow, or 
turn him out of the house. Nobody should suffer his 
hero to have a black eye, or to be pulled by the nose. 
The Iliad would never have come down to these times 
if Agamemnon had given Achilles a box on the ear. 
We should have trembled for the iEneid, if any Ty- 
rian nobleman had kicked the pious iEneas in the 4th 
book. iEneas may have deserved it ; but he could not 
have founded the Roman empire after so distressing 
an accident. 



ISLAND OF CEYLON. (Edinburgh Review, 1803.) 
An Account of the Island of Ceylon. By Robert Percival, 

Esq., of his Majesty's Nineteenth Regiment of Foot. 

London. C. and R. Baldwin. 

It is now little more than half a century since the 
English first began to establish themselves in any force 
upon the peninsula of India ; and we at present pos- 
sess in that country, a more extensive territory, and 
a more numerous population, than any European power 
can boast of at home. In no instance has the genius 
of the English, and their courage, shone forth more 
conspicuously than in their contest with the French 
for the empire of India. The numbers on both sides 
were always inconsiderable ; but the two nations were 
fairly matched against each other, in the cabinet and 
the field ;" the struggle was long and obstinate ; and, 



at the conclusion, the French remained masters of a 
dismantled town, and the English of the grandest and 
most extensive colony that the world has ever seen. — 
To attribute this success to the superior genius of 
Clive, is not to diminish the reputation it confers on 
his country, which reputation must of course be eleva- 
ted by the namber of great men to which it gives 
birth. But the French were by no means deficient in 
casualties of genius at that period, unless Bussy is to 
be considered as a man of common stature of mind, or 
Dupleix to be classed with the vulgar herd of politi- 
cians. Neither was Clive (though he clearly stands 
forward as the most prominent figure in the group) 
without the aid of some military men of very consider- 
able talents. Clive extended our Indian empire ; but 
General Lawrence preserved it to be extended; and 
the former caught, perhaps, from the latter, that mili- 
tary spirit by which he soon became a greater soldier 
than him, without whom he never would have been a 
soldier at all. 

Gratifying as these reflections upon our prowess in 
India are to national pride, they bring with them the 
painful reflection, that so considerable a portion of our 
strength and wealth is vested upon such precarious 
foundations, and at such an immense distance from the 
parent country. The glittering fragments of the Por- 
tuguese empire, scattered up and down the East, 
should teach us the instability of such dominion. We 
are (it is true) better capable of preserving what we 
have obtained, than any other nation which has ever 
colonized in Southern Asia : but the object of ambition 
is so tempting, and the perils to which it is exposed so 
numerous, that no calculating mind can found any du- 
rable conclusions upon this branch of our commerce, 
and this source of our strength. 

In the acquisition of Ceylon, we have obtained the 
greatest of all our wants — a good harbour. For it is a 
very singular fact, that, in the whole peninsula of In- 
dia, Bombay is alone capable of affording a safe retreat 
to ships during the period of the monsoons. 

The geographical figure of our possessions in Ceylon 
is whimsical enough : we possess the whole of the sea- 
coast, and enclose in a periphery the unfortunate King 
of Candia, whose rugged and mountainous dominions 
may be compared to a coarse mass of iron, set in a 
circle of silver. The Popilian ring, in which this vo- 
tary of Buddha has been so long held by the Portuguese 
and Dutch, has infused the most vigilant jealousy into 
the government, and rendered it as difficult to enter 
the kingdom of Candia, as if it were Paradise or China ; 
and yet, once there, always there ; for the difficulty of 
departing is just as great as the difficulty of arriving ; 
and his Candiaa excellency, who has used every device 
m his power to keep them out, is seized with such an 
affection for those who baffle his defensive artifices, — 
that he can on no account suffer them to depart. He 
has been known to detain a string of four or five Dutch 
embassies, till various members of the legation died of 
old age at his court, while they were expecting an an- 
swer to their questions, and a return to their presents :* 
and his majesty once exasperated a little French am- 
bassador to such a degree, by the various pretences 
under which he kept him at his court, that this lively 
member of the corps diplomatique, one day, in a furi- 
ous passion, attacked six or seven of his majesty's lar- 
gest elephants sword in hand, and would, in all proba- 
bility, have reduced them to mince-meat, if the poor 
beasts had not been saved from the unequal combat. 

The best and most ample account of Ceylon is con- • 
tained in the narrative of Robert Knox, who', in the 
middle of the 17th century, was taken prisoner there 
(while refitting his ship) at the age or nineteen, and 
remained nineteen years on the island, in slavery to 
the King of Candia. During this period, he learnt the 
language, and acquired a thorough knowledge of the 
people. The account he has given of them is extreme- 
ly entertaining, and written in a very simple and unaf- 
fected style ; so much so, indeed, that he presents his' 
reader with a very grave account of the noise the devil 
makes in the woods of Candia, and of the frequent op- 
portunities he has had of hearing him. 



Knox's Ceylon. 



ISLAND OF CEYLON. 



237 



Mr. Percival does not pretend to deal with the devil ; 
but appears to have used the fair and natural resour- 
ces of observation and good sense, to put together an 
interesting description of Ceylon. There is nothing 
in the book very animated, or very profound, but it is 
without pretentions ; and if it does not excite atten- 
tion by any unusual powers of description, it never 
disgusts by credulity, wearies by prolixity, or offends 
by affectation. It is such an account as a plain mili- 
tary man of diligence and common sense might be ex- 
pected to compose ; and narratives like these we must 
not despise. To military men we have been, and must 
be, indebted for our first acquaintance with the interi- 
or of many countries. Conquest has explored more 
than ever curiosity has done : and the path for science 
has been commonly opened by the sword. 

We shall proceed to give a very summary abstract 
of the principal contents of Mr. PercivaPs book. 

The immense accessions of territory which the Eng- 
lish have acquired in the East Indies since the Ameri- 
can war, rendered it absolutely necessary, that some 
effort should be made to obtain possession of a station 
where ships might remain in safety during the violent 
storms incidental to that climate. As the whole of 
that large track which we possess along the Coroman- 
del coast presents nothing but open roads, all vessels 
are obliged, on the approach of the monsoons, to stand 
out in the open seas ; and there are many parts of the 
coast that can be approached only during a few 
months of the year. As the harbour of Trincomalee, 
which is equally secure at all seasons, afforded the 
means of obviating these disadvantages, it is evident 
that, on the first rupture with the Dutch, our country- 
men would attempt to gain possession of it. A body 
of troops was, in consequence, detached in the year 
1795, for the conquest of Ceylon, which (in conse- 
quence of the indiscipline which political dissension 
had introduced among the Dutch troops) was effected 
almost without opposition. 

Ceylon is now inhabited by the English ; the re- 
mains of the Dutch and Portuguese, the Cinglese or 
natives, subject to the dominion of the Europeans ; the 
Candians, subject to the king of their own name ; and 
the Vaddahs, or wild men, subject to no power. A 
Ceylonese Dutchman is a coarse, grotesque species of 
animal, whose native apathy and phlegm is animated 
only by the insolence of a colonial tyrant: his princi- 
pal amusement appears to consist in smoking ; but his 
pipe, according to Mr. Percival's account, is so seldom 
out of his mouth, that his smoking appears to be al- 
most as much a necessary function of animal life as 
his breathing. His day is eked out with gin, ceremo- 
nious visits, and prodigious quantities of gross food, 
dripping with oil and butter; his mind, just able to 
reach from one meal to another, is incapable of farther 
exertion ; and, after the panting and deglutition of a 
long protracted dinner, reposes on the sweet expecta- 
tion that, in a few hours, the carnivorous toil will be 
renewed. He lives only to digest, and, while the or- 
gans of gluttony perform their office, he has not a wish 
beyond; and is the happy man which Horace de- 
scribes : — 

in seipso totus, teres, atque rotundus. 

The descendants of the Portuguese differ materially 
from the Moors, Malabars, and other Mahometans.— 
Their great object is to show the world they are Eu- 
ropeans and Christians. Unfortunately, their ideas of 
Christianity are so imperfect, that the "only mode they 
can hit upon of displaying their faith, is by wearing 
hats and breeches, and by these habiliments they con- 
sider themselves as showing a proper degree of con- 
tempt, on various parts of the body, towards Maho- 
met and Buddha. They are lazy, treacherous, effemi- 
nate, and passionate to excess ; and are, in fact, a lo- 
comotive and animated farrago of the bad qualities 
of all tongues, people, and nations, on the face of the 
earth. 

The Maylays, whom we forgot before to enumerate, 
form a very considerable portion of the inhabitants of 
Ceylon. Their original empire lies in the peninsula 
of Malacca, from whence they have extended them- 
selves over Java, Sumatra, the Moluccas, and a vast 
number of other islands in the peninsula of India. It 



has been many years customary for the Dutch to bring 
them to Ceylon, for the purpose of carrying on vari- 
ous branches of trade and manufacture, and in order 
to employ them as soldiers and servants. The JMa 
lays are the most vindictive and ferocious of living be- 
ings. They set little or no value on their existence, in 
the prosecution of their odious passions ; and having 
thus broken the great tie which renders man a being 
capable of being governed, and fit for society, they are 
a constant source of terror to all those who have any 
kind of connection or relation with them. A Malay 
servant, from the apprehension excited by his vindict- 
ive disposition, often becomes the master of his mas- 
ter. It is as dangerous to dismiss him as to punish 
him ; and the rightful despot, in order to avoid assas- 
sination, is almost compelled to exchange characters 
with his slave. It is singular, however, that the Ma- 
lay, incapable of submission on any other occasion, 
and ever ready to avenge insult with death, submits to 
the severest military discipline with the utmost resig- 
nation and meekness. The truth is, obedience to his 
officers forms part of his religious creed ; and the same 
man who would repay the most insignificant insult 
with death, will submit to be lacerated at the halbert 
with the patience of a martyr. This is truly a tre- 
mendous people ! When assassins and blood-hounds 
will fall into rank and file, and the most furious sava- 
ges submit (with no diminution of their ferocity) to 
the science and discipline of war, they only want a 
Malay Bonaparte to lead them to the conquest of the 
world. Our curiosity has always been very highly ex- 
cited by the accounts of this singular people ; and we 
cannot help thinking, that, one day or another, when 
they are more full of opium than usual, they tvill run 
a muck from Cape Comorin to the Caspian. 

Mr. Percival does not consider the Ceylonese as de- 
scended from the continentals of the peninsula, but 
rather from the inhabitants of the Maldive Islands, 
whom they very much resemble in complexion, fea- 
tures, language, and manners. 

' The Ceylonese (says Mr. Percival) are courteous and po- 
lite in their demeanour, even to a degree far exceeding their 
civilization. In several qualities they are superior to all 
other Indians who have fallen within the sphere of my ob- 
servation. I have already exempted them from the censure 
of stealing and lying, which seem to be almost inherent in 
the nature of an Indian. They are mild, and by no means 
captious or passionate in their intercourse with each other ; 
though, when once their anger is roused, it is proportionally 
furious and lasting. Their hatred is indeed mortal, and 
they will frequently destroy themselves to obtain the des- 
truction of the detested object. One instance will serve to 
show the extent to which this passion is carried. If a Cey- 
lonese cannot obtain money due to him by another, he goes 
to his debtor, and threatens to kill himself if he is not in- 
stantly paid. This threat, which is sometimes put in execu- 
tion, reduces the debtor, if it be in his power, to immediate 
compliance with the demand : as, by their law, if any man 
causes the less of another man's life, his own is the forfeit, 
" An eye for an eye, and a tooth for a tooth," is a prover- 
bial expression continually in their mouths. This is, on 
other occasions, a very common mode of revenge among 
them ; and a Ceylonese has often been known to contrive to 
kill himself in the company of his enemy, that the latter 
might suffer for it. 

' This dreadful spirit of revenge, so inconsistent with the 
usually mild and humane sentiments of the Ceylonese, and 
much more congenial to the bloody temper of a Malay, still 
continues to be fostered by the sacred customs of the Can- 
dians. Among the Cinglese, however, it has been greatly 
mitigated by their intercourse with Europeans. The des- 
perate mode of obtaining revenge which I have just des- 
cribed, has been given up, from having been disappointed 
gf its object ; as in all those parts under our dominion, the 
European modes of investigating and punishing crimes are 
enforced. A case of this nature occurred at Caltura, in 
1799. A Cinglese peasant happening to have a suit or con- 
troversy with another, watched an opportunity of going to 
bathe in company with him, and drowned himself, with the 
view of having his adversary put to death. The latter was 
upon this taken up, and sent to Columbo, to take his trial for 
making away with the deceased, upon the principle of hav- 
ing been the last seen in his company. There was, how- 
ever, nothing more than presumptive proof against the cul- 
prit, and he was of course acquitted,, This decision, how- 
ever, did not by any means tally witb the sentiments of the 
Cinglese, who are as much inclined to continue their ancient 
barbarous practice as their brethren the Candians, although 
they are deprived of the power,'— (pp. 70—730 



S38 



WORKS OF THE REV. SIDNEY SMITH. 



The warlike habits of the Candians make them look 
•with contempt on the Cinglese, who are almost entire- 
ly unacquainted with the management of arms. They 
have the habit and character of mountaineers — war- 
like, hardy, enterprising, and obstinate. They have, 
at various times, proved themselves very formidable 
enemies to the Dutch ; and in that kind of desultory 
warfare, which is the only one their rugged country 
will admit of, have cut on large parties of the troops 
of both these nations. The King of Candia, as we 
have before mentioned, possesses only the middle of 
the island, which nature, and his Candian majesty, 
have rendered as inaccessible as possible. It is tra- 
versable only by narrow wood-paths, known to nobody 
but the natives, strictly watched in peace and war, 
and where the best troops in the world might be shot 
in any quantities by the Candian marksmen, without 
the smallest possibility of resisting their enemies ; be- 
cause there would not be the smallest possibility of 
finding them. The King of Candia is of course de- 
spotic : and the history of his life and reign presents 
the same monotonous ostentation, and baby-like ca- 
price, which characterize oriental governments. In 
public audiences he appears like a great fool, squat- 
ting on his hams ; far surpassing gingerbread in splen- 
dour; and, after asking some idiotical question, as 
whether Europe is in Asia or Africa, retires with a 
flourish of trumpets vjry much out of tune. For his 
private amusement, he rides on the nose of an ele- 
phant, plays with his jewels, sprinkles his courtiers 
with rose-water, and feeds his gold and silver fish. If 
his tea is not sweet enough, he impales his footman ; 
and smites off the head of half a dozen of his noble- 
men, if he has a pain in his own. 

— wanep yap (says Aristotle) reXcwQtv fieXrto-TOV twv ^woji/ 
ai/f/jSWTrosfort, ovtcj kcli ^wpiaOev vo/xov, Kai dtKrjs %£iptSrov 
navruv. Polit. 

The only exportable articles of any importance 
which Ceylon produces, are pearls, cinnamon, and ele- 
phants. Mr. Percival has presented us with an ex- 
tremely interesting account of the pearl fishery, held 
in Condatchy Bite, near the island of Manaar, in the 
straits which separate Ceylon from the main land. 

' There is perhaps no spectacle which the island of Cey- 
lon affords more striking to an European, than the Bay of 
Condatchy, during the season of the pearl fishery. This 
desert and barren spot is at that time converted into a scene, 
which exceeds, in novelty and variety, almost any thing I 
ever witnessed. Several thousands of people, of different 
colours, countries, castes, and occupations, continually pass- 
ing and repassing in a busy crowd ; the vast numbers of 
small tents and huts erected on the shore, with the bazaar 
or market place before each ; the multitude of boats return- 
ing in the afternoon from the pearl banks, some of them 
laden with riches ; the anxious expecting countenances of 
the boat-owners, while the boats are approaching the shore, 
and the eagerness and avidity with which they run to them 
when arrived, in hopes of a rich cargo ; the vast numbers 
of jewellers, brokers, merchants of ail colours and all des- 
criptions, both natives and foreigners, who are occupied in 
some way or other with the pearls, some separating and as- 
sorting them, others weighing and ascertaining their num- 
ber and value, while others are hawking them about, or 
drilling and boring them for future use; — all these circum- 
stances tend to impress the mind with the value and impor- 
tance of that object, which can of itself create this scene. 

'The bay of Condatchy is the mostcentral rendezvous for 
the boats employed in the fishery The banks where it is 
carried on, extend several miles along the coast from Ma- 
naar southward off Arippo, Condatchy, and Pomparipo. 
The principal bank is opposite to Condatchy, and lies out at 
sea about twenty miles. The first step, previous to the 
commencement of the fishery, is to have the different oyster 
banks surveyed, the state of the oysters ascertained, and a 
report made on the subject to government. If it has been 
found that the quantity is sufficient, and that they are arrived 
at a proper degree of maturity, the particular banks to be 
fished that year are put up for sale to the highest bidder, 
and are usually purchased by a black merchant. This, 
however, is not always the course pursued : government 
sometimes judges it more advantageous to fish the banks on 
its own account, and to dispose of the pearls to the mer- 
chants. When this plan is adopted, boats are hired for the 
seaeon on account of government, from different quarters ; 
the price varies considerably according to circumstances ; 
but is usually from five to eight hundred pagodas for each 



boat. There are, however, no stated prices, and the best 
bargain possible is made for each boat separately. The 
Dutch generally followed this last system ; the banks were 
fished on government account, and the pearls disposed of in 
different parts of India or sent to Europe. When this plan 
was pursued, the governor and council of Ceylon claimed a 
certain per centage on the value of the pearls ; or, if the 
fishing of the banks was disposed of by public sale, they 
bargained for a stipulated sum to themselves over and 
above what was paid on account of government. The 
pretence on which they founded their claims for this perqui- 
site, was their trouble-in surveying and valuing the banks.' 
—(pp. 59—61.) 

The banks are divided into six or seven portions, in 
order to give the oysters time to grow, which are sup- 
posed to attain their maturity in about seven years. 
The period allowed the merchant to complete his 
fishery, is about six weeks, during which period all the 
boats go out and return together, and are subject to 
very rigorous laws. The dexterity of the divers is 
very striking ; they are as adroit in the use of their 
feet as their hands ; and can pick up the smallest ob- 
ject under water with their toes. Their descent is 
aided by a great stone, which they slip from their feet 
when they arrive at the bottom, where they can re- 
main about two minutes. There are instances, how- 
ever, of divers, who have so much of the aquatic in 
their nature, as to remain under water for five or six 
minutes. Their great enemy is the ground-shark ; 
for the rule of, eat and be eaten, which Dr. Darwin 
called the great law of nature, obtains in as much 
force fathoms deep beneath the waves as above them : 
this animal is as fond of the legs of Hindoos, as the 
Hindoos are of the pearls of oysters ; and as one appe- 
tite appears to him much more natural, and less ca- 
pricious than the other, he never fails to indulge in it. 
Where fortune has so much to do with peril and pro- 
fit, of course there is no deficiency of conjurers, who, 
by divers enigmatical grimaces, endeavour to ostracise 
this submarine invader. If they are successful, they 
are well paid in pearls ; and if a shark indulges him- 
self with the leg of a Hindoo, there is a witch who 
lives at Colang, on the Malabar coast, who always 
bears the blame. 

A common mode of theft practised by the common 
people engaged in the pearl fishery, is by swallowing 
the pearls. Whenever any one is suspected of having 
swallowed these precious pills of Cleopatra, the po- 
lice apothecaries are instantly sent for ; a brisk ca- 
thartic is immediately despatched after the truant 
pearl, with the strictest orders to apprehend it, in 
whatever corner of the viscera it may be found lurk- 
ing. Oyster lotteries are carried on here to a great 
extent. They consist in purchasing a quantity of the 
oysters unopened, and running the chance of either 
finding or not finding pearls in them. The European 
gentlemen and officers who attend the pearl fishery 
through duty or curiosity, are particularly fond of 
these lotteries, and frequently make purchases of this 
sort. The whole of this account is very well written, 
and has afforded us a great degree of amusement. By 
what curious links and fantastical relations, are man- 
kind connected together ! At the distance of half the 
globe, a Hindoo gains his support by groping at the 
bottom of the sea, for the morbid concretion of a shell 
fish, to decorate the throat of a London alderman's 
wife. It is said that the great Linnaeus had discovered 
the secret of infecting oysters with this perligenous 
disease : what is become of the secret we do not 
know, as the only interest we take in oysters is of 
a much more vulgar, though, perhaps, a more humane 
nature. 

The principal woods of cinnamon lie in the neigh- 
bourhood of Columbo. They reach to within half a 
mile of the fort, and fill the whole surrounding pros- 
pect. The grand garden near the town is so extensive, 
as to occupy a track of country from ten to fifteen i 
miles in length. 

' Nature has here concentrated both the beauty and the 
riches of the island. Nothing can be more delightful to the 
eye, than the prospect which stretches around Columbo. 
The low cinnamon trees which cover the plain, allow the 
view to reach the groves of evergreens, interspersed with 
tall clumps, and bounded everywhere with extensive ranges > 



DEIPHINE. 



of cocoa-nut and other large trees. The whole is diversified 
with small lakes and green marshes, skirted all round with 
rice and pasture fields. In one part, the intertwining cin- 
namon trees appear completely to clothe the face of the 
plain ; in another, the openings made by the intersecting 
footpaths just serve to show that the thick underwood has 
been penetrated. One large road, which goes out at the 
west gate of the fort, and returns by the gate on the south, 
makes a winding circuit of seven miles among the woods. 
It is here that the officers and gentlemen belonging to the 
garrison of Columbo take their morning ride, and enjoy 
one of the finest scenes in nature.'— (pp. 336, 337.) 

As this spice constitutes the wealth of Ceylon, great 
pains are«taken to ascertain its qualities, and to pro- 
pagate its choicest kinds. The prime sort is obtained 
From the Laurus Cinnamonium. The leaf resembles 
the laurel in shape, but is not of so deep a green. 
When chewed it has the smell and taste of cloves. 
There are several different species of cinnamon trees 
on the island ; but four sorts only are cultivated and 
barked. The picture which we have just quoted from 
Mr. Percival of a mornipg ride in a cinnamon wood is 
so enchanting, that we are extremely sorry the addi- 
tion of aromatic odours cannot with veracity be made 
to it. The cinnamon has, unfortunately, no smell at 
all but to the nostrils of the poet. Mr. Percival gives 
us a very interesting account of the process of ma- 
king up cinnamon for the market, in which we are 
sorry our iimits will not permit us to follow him. The 
different qualities of the cinnamon bundles can only 
be estimated by the taste ; an office which devolves 
upon the medical men of the settlement, who are em- 
ployed for several days together in chewing cinnamon, 
the acrid juice of which excoriates the mouth, and 
puts them to the most dreadful tortures. 

The island of Ceylon is completely divided into two 
parts by a very high range of mountains, on the two 
sides of which the climate and the seasons are entire- 
ty different. These mountains also terminate com- 
pletely the effect of the monsoons, which set in peri- 
odically from opposite sides of them. On the west 
side, the rains prevail in the months of May, June, 
and July, the season when they are felt on the Mala- 
bar coast. This monsoon is usually extremely violent 
during its continuance. The northern parts of the 
island are very little affected. In the months of Octo- 
ber and November, when the opposite monsoon sets 
in on the Coromandel coast, the north of the island is 
attacked; and scarcely any impression reaches the 
southern parts. The heat during the day is nearly 
the same throughout the year ; the rainy season ren- 
ders the nights much cooler. The climate, upon the 
whole, is much more temperate than on the continent 
of India. The temperate and healthy climate of Cey- 
lon, is, however, confined to the sea-coast. In the in- 
terior of the country, the obstructions which the thick 
woods oppose to the free circulation of air, render the 
heat almost insupportable, and generate a low and 
malignant fever, known to Europeans by the name of 
the Jungle fever. The chief harbours of Ceylon are 
Trincomalee, Point de Gallee, and, at certain seasons 
of the year, Columbo. The former of these, from its 
nature and situation, is that which stamps Ceylon one 
of our most valuable acquisitions in the East Indies. 
As soon as the monsoons commence, every vessel 
caught by them in any other part of the Bay of Bengal 
is obliged to put to sea immediately, in order to avoid 
destruction. At these seasons, Trincomalee alone, of 
all the parts on this side of the peninsula, is capable 
of affording to vessels a safe retreat ; which a vessel 
from Madras may reach in two days. These circum- 
stances render the value of Trincomalee much greater 
than that of the whole island ; the revenue of which 
will certainly be hardly sufficient to defray the ex- 
pense of the establishments kept up there. The agri- 
culture of Ceylon, is, in fact, in such an imperfect 
state, and the natives have so little availed themselves 
of its natural fertility, that great part of the provisions 
necessary for its support, are imported from Bengal. 

Ceylon produces the elephant, the buffalo, tiger, 
elk, wild-hog, rabbit, hare, flying-fox, and musk-rat. 
Many articles are rendered entirely useless by the 
smell of musk, which this latter animal communicates 
merely running over them. Mr. Percival asserts 



(and the fact has been confirmed to us by the most 
respectable authority) , that if it even pass over a bot- 
tle of wine, however well corked and sealed up, the 
wine becomes so strongly tainted with musk, that it 
cannot be used : and a whole cask may be rendered 
useless in the same manner. Among the great vari- 
ety of birds, we were struck with Mr. Percival's ac- 
count of the honey-bird, in whose body the soul of a 
common informer appears to have migrated. It 
makes a loud and shrill noise, to attract the notice of 
any body whom it may perceive ; and thus inducing 
him to follow the course it points out, leads him 
to the tree where the bees have concealed their trea- 
sure ; after the apiary has been robbed, this feathered 
scoundrel gleans his reward from the hive. The list 
of Ceylonese snakes is hideous ; and we become re- 
conciled to the crude and cloudy land in which we 
live, from reflecting, that the indiscriminate activity 
of the sun generates what is loathsome, as well as 
what is lovely ; that the asp reposes under the rose ; 
and the scorpion crawls imder tke fragrant flower, and 
the luscious fruit. 

The usual stories are related here, of the immense 
size and voracious appetite of a certain species of ser- 
pent. The best history of this kind we ever remem- 
ber to have read, was of a serpent killed near one of 
our settlements, in the East Indies ; in whose body 
they found the chaplain of the garrison, all in black, 

the Rev. Mr. (somebody or other, whose name 

we have forgotten,) and who, after having been miss- 
ing for above a week, was discovered in this very in- 
convenient situation. The dominions of the King of 
Candia are partly defended by leeches, which abound 
in the woods, and from which our soldiers suffered in 
the most dreadful manner. The Ceylonese, in com- 
pensation for their animated plagues, are endowed 
with two vegetable blessings, the cocoa-nut tree and 
the talpot tree. The latter affords a prodigious leaf, 
impenetrable to sun or rain, and large enough to shel- 
ter ten men. It is a natural umbrella, and is of as 
eminent service in that country as a great-coat tree 
would be in this. A leaf of the talipot tree is a tent to 
the soldier, a parasol to the traveller, and a book to 
the scholar.* The cocoa tree affords bread,- mil,k, 
oil, wine, spirits, vinegar, yeast, sugar, cloth, paper, 
huts, and ships. 

We could with great pleasure proceed to give a fur- 
ther abstract of this very agreeable and interesting 
publication, which we very strongly recommend to 
the public. It is written with great modesty, entirely 
without pretensions, and abounds with curious and 
important information. Mr. Percival will accept our 
best thanks for the amusement he has afforded us. 
When we can praise with such justice, we are always 
happy to do it ; and regret that the rigid and indepen- 
dent honesty which we have made the very basis of 
our literary undertaking, should so frequently compel 
us to speak of the authors who come before us, in a 
style so different from that in which we have vindica- 
ted the merits of Mr. Percival. 



DELPHINE. (Edinburgh Review, 1803.) 

Ddphine. By Madame de Stael Holstein. London. Maw- 
man. 6 vols. 12 mo. 

This dismal trash which has nearly dislocated the 
jaws of every critic among us with gaping, has so 
alarmed Bonaparte, that he has seized the whole im- 
pression, sent Madame de Stael out of Paris, and, for 
ought we know, sleeps in a night-cap of steel, and 
dagger-proof blankets. To us it appears rather an at- 
tack upon the Ten Commandments, than the govern- 
ment of Bonaparte, and calculated not so much to en- 
force the rights of the Bourbons, as the benefits of 
adultery, murder, and a great number of other vices, 
which have been somehow or other strangely neglect- 
ed in this country, aud too much so (according to the 
apparent opinion of Madame de Stael) even in France. 

* All books are written upon it in Ceylon. 



240 



WORKS OF THE REV. SIDNEY SMITH, 



It happens, however, fortunately enough, that her 
book is as dull as it could have been if her intentions 
had been good ; for wit, dexterity, and the pleasant 
energies of the mind, seldom rank themselves on the 
side of virtue and social order ; while vice is spiritual, 
eloquent, and alert, ever choice in expression, happy 
hi allusion, and judicious in arrangement. 

The story is simply this.— Delphine, a rich young 
widow, presents her cousin Matilda de Vernon with a 
considerable estate, iti order to enable her to marry 
Leonce Mondeville. To this action she is excited by 
the arts and the intrigues of Madame de Vernon, an 
hackneyed Parisian lady, who hopes, by this marri- 
age, to be able to discharge her numerous and press- 
ing debts. Leonce, who, like all other heroes of no- 
vels, has fine limbs, and fine qualities, comes to Paris 
—dislikes Matilda— falls in love with Delphine— Del- 
phine with him ; and they are upon the eve of jilting 
poor Matilda, when, from some false reports respect- 
ing the character of Delphine (which are aggravated 
by her own imprudences, and by the artifices of Ma- 
dame Vernon), Leonce, not in a fit of honesty, but of 
revenge, marries the lady he came to marry. Soon 
after, Madame de Vernon dies— discovers the artifices 
by which she had prevented the union of Leonce and 
Delphine — and then, after this catastrophe, which 
ought to have terminated the novel, comes too long vo- 
lumes of complaint and despair. Delphine becomes a 
man — runs away from the nunnery with Leonce, who 
is taken by some French soldiers, upon the supposition 
that he has been serving in the French emigrant army 
against his country— is shot, and upon his dead body 
falls Delphine as dead as he. _ 

Making every allowance for reading this book in a 
translation, and in a very bad translation, we cannot 
but deem it a heavy performance. The incidents are 
vulgar; the characters vulgar, too, except those of 
Delphine and Madame de Vernon. Madame de Stael 
has not the artifice to hide what is coming. In travel- 
ling through a flat country, or a flat book, we see our 
road before us for half the distance we are going. 
There are no agreeable sinuosities, and no specula- 
tions whether we are to ascend next or descend ; what 
new sight we are to enjoy, or to which side we are to 
bend. °Leonce is robbed and half murdered; the apo- 
thecary of the place is certain he will not live ; we 
were absolutely certain that he would live, and could 
predict to an hour the time of his recovery. In the 
same manner we could have prophesied every event 
of the book a whole volume before its occurrence. 

This novel is a perfect Alexandrian. The two last 
volumes are redundant, and drag their wounded 
length : it should certainly have terminated where 
the interest ceases, at the death of Madame de Ver- 
non ; but, instead of this, the scene-shifters come and 
pick up the dead bodies, wash the stage, sweep it, 
and do every thing which the timely fall of the cur- 
tain should have excluded from the sight, and left to 
the imagination of the audience. We humbly appre- 
hend, that young gentlemen do not in general make 
their 'tutors the confidants of their passion ; at least we 
can find no rule of that kind laid down either by Miss 
Hamilton or Miss Edgeworth, in their treatises on edu- 
cation. The tutor of Leonce is Mr. Barton, a grave old 
gentleman, in a peruke and snuff-coloured clothes. In- 
stead of writing to this solemn personage about se- 
cond causes, the ten categories, and the eternal fitness 
of things, the young lover raves to him, for whole pa- 
ges, about the white neck and auburn hair of his Del- 
phine ; and, shame to tell ! the liquorish old peda- 
gogue seems to think these amorous ebullitions the 
pleasantest sort of writing in usum Delphini that he 
has yet met with. 

By altering one word, and making only one false 
quantity,* we shall change the rule of Horace to 
' Nee febris intersit nisi dignus vindice nodus 

Incident.' 

Delphine and Leonce have eight very bad typhus fe- 

• Perhaps a fault of all others which the English are least 
disposed to pardon. A young man, who, on a public occa- 
■ion, makes a false quantity at the ouUet of life, can sel- 
dom or never get over it. 



vers between them, besides hcemoptoe, hemorrhage, 
deliquiumanimi, singultus, hysteria, and fceminei ulula- 
tus, or screams innumerable. Now, that there should 
be a reasonable allowance of sickness in every novel, 
we are willing to admit, and will cheerfully permit 
the heroine to be once given over, and at the point of 
death ; but we cannot consent, that the interest which 
ought to be excited by the feelings of the mind should 
be transferred to the sufferings of the body, and a 
crisis of perspiration be substituted for a crisis of pas- 
sion. Let as see difficulties overcome, if our appro- 
bation is required ; we cannot grant it to such cheap 
and sterile i artifices as these. 

The characters in this novel are all said to be drawn 
from real life ; and the persons for whom they are in- 
tended are loudly whispered at Paris. Most of them 
we have forgotten ; but Delphine is said to be intended 
for the authoress, and Madame de Vernon (by a slight 
sexual metamorphosis) for Talleyrand, minister of 
the French republic for foreign affairs. As this lady 
(once the friend of the authoress) may probably ex- 
ercise a considerable influence over the destinies of 
this country, we shall endeavour to make our readers 
a little better acquainted with her ; but we must first 
remind them that she was once a bishop, a higher 
dignity in the church than was ever attained by any of 
her sex since the days of Pope Joan ; and that though 
she swindles Delphine out of her estate with a consid- 
erable degree of address, her dexterity sometimes fails 
her, as in the memorable instance of the American 
commissioners. Madame de Stael gives the following 
description of this pastoral metropolitan female : 

< Though she is at least forty, she still appears charming 
even among the young and beautiful of her own sex. The 
paleness of her complexion, the slight relaxation of her fea- 
tures, indicate the languor of indisposition, and not the de- 
cay of years ; the easy negligence of her dress accords with 
this impression. Every one concludes, that when her health 
is recovered, and she dresses with more care, she must be 
completely beautiful : this change, however, never happens, 
but it is always expected ; and that is sufficient to make the 
imagination still add something more to the natural effect 
of her charms.'— (Vol. I., p. 21.) 

Nothing can be more execrable than the manner in 
which this book is translated. The bookseller has 
employed one of our countrymen for that purpose, 
who appears to have been very lately caught. The 
contrast between the passionate exclamations of Ma- 
dame de Stael, and the barbarous vulgarities of poor 
Sawney, produces a mighty ludicrous effect. One of 
the heroes, a man of high fastidious temper, exclaims 
in a letter to Delphine, < I cannot endure this Paris ; I 
have met with ever so many people whom my soul ab- 
hors.' And the accomplished and enraptured Leonce 
terminates one of his letcers thus : < Adieu ! adieu ! my , 
dearest Delphine. I will give you a call to-morrow.' 
We doubt if Grub street ever imported from Caledonia I 
a more abominable translator. 

We admit the character of Madame de Vernon to be 
drawn with considerable skill. There are occasional ! 
traits of eloquence and pathos in this novel, and very 
many of those observations upon manners and charac- 
rer, which are totally out of the reach of all who have 
lived not long in the world, and observed it well. 

The immorality of any book (in our estimation) is 
to be determined by the general impression it leaves^ 
on those minds, whose principles, not yet ossified, arei 
capable of affording a less powerful defence to its in- 
fluence. The most dangerous effect that any fictitious 
character can produce, is when two or three of its*; 
popular vices are varnished over with every thing that r 
is captivating and gracious in the exterior, and enno- 
bled by association with splendid virtues : this apolo- 
gy will be more sure of its effect, if the faults are not! 
against nature, but against society. The aversion to 
murder and cruelty could not perhaps be so overcome ; 
but a regard to the sanctity of marriage vows, to the 
sacred and sensitive delicacy of the female character, 
and to numberless restrictions important to the well-i 
being of our species, may easily be relaxed by this 
subtle and voluptuous confusion of good and evil. It i 
is in vain to say the fable evinces, in the last act, that: 
vice is productive of misery. We may decorate a vil-i 



ASHANTEE. 841 

lain with graces and felicities for nine volumes, and I sure to add, that the badness of the principles is aio»* 
hang him in the last page. This is not teaching vir- corrected by the badness of the style, and that this 
e, but gilding the gallows, and raising up splendid I celebrated lady would have been very guilty, if she 



associations in favour of being hanged. In such an 
union of the amiable and the vicious, (especially if the 
vices are such, to the commission of which there is no 
want of natural disposition,) the vice will not degrade 
the man, but the man will ennoble the vice. We shall 
wish to be him we admire, in spite of his vices, and, if 
the novel be well written, even in consequence of his 
vice. There exists, through the whole of this novel, 
a show of exquisite sensibility to the evils which indi- 
viduals suffer by the inflexible rules of virtue prescribed 
by society, and an eager disposition to apologize for 
particular transgressions. Such doctrine is not con- 
fined to Madame de Stael; an Arcadian cant is gaining 
fast upon Spartan gravity ; and the happiness diffused, 
and the beautiful order established in society, by this 
unbending discipline, are wholly swallowed up in com- 
passion for the unfortunate and interesting individual. 
Either the exceptions or the rule must be given up : 
every highwayman who thrusts his pistol into a chaise 
window has met with unforeseen misfortunes ; and 
every loose matron who flies into the arms of her 
Greville was compelled to marry an old man whom 
she detested, by an avaricious and unfeeling father. 
The passions want not accelerating, but retarding ma- 
chinery. This fatal and foolish sophistry has power 
enough over every heart, not to need aid of fine com- 
position, and well-contrived incident — auxiliaries 
which Madame de Stael intended to bring forward in 
the cause, though she has fortunately not succeeded. 

M. de Serbellone is received as a guest into the house 
of M. d'Ervins, whose wife he debauches as a recom- 
pense for his hospitality. Is it possible to be disgust- 
ed with ingratitude and injustice, when united to such 
an assemblage of talents and virtues as this man of 
paper possesses ? Was there ever a more delightful, 
fascinating adulteress than Madame d'Ervins is inten- 
ded to be ? or a povero cornuto less capable of exciting 
compassion than her husband ? The morality of ail 
this is the old morality of Farquhar, Vanburgh, and 
Congreve — that every witty man may transgress the 
seventh commandment, which was never meant for the 
protection of husbands who labour under the incapacity 
of making repartees. In Matilda, religion is always as 
unamiable as dissimulation is graceful in Madame de 
Vernon, and imprudence generous in Delphine. This 
said Delphine, with her fine auburn hair, and her beau 
tiful blue or green eyes (we forget which), cheats her 
cousin Matilda out of her lover, alienates the affec- 
tions of her husband, and keeps a sort of assignation 
house for Serbellone and his chere amie, justifying her- 
self by the most touching complaints against the ri- 
gour of the world, and using the customary phrases, 
union of souls, married in the eye of heaven, &c. &c. 
&c, and such like diction, the type.s of which Mr. 
Lane, of the Minerva Press, very prudently keeps 
ready composed, in order to facilitate the printing of 

the Adventures of Captain ° and Miss F , and 

other interesting stories, of which he, the said inimita- 
ble Mr. Lane, of the Minerva Press, well knows these 
sentiments must make a part. Another perilous ab- 
surdity which this useful production tends to cherish, 
is the common notion, that contempt of rule and order 
is a proof of greatness of mind. Delphine is every- 
where a great spirit struggling with the shackles im- 
posed upon her in common with the little world around 
her ; and it is managed so that her contempt of res- 
trictions shall always appear to flow from the extent, 
variety, and splendour of her talents. The vulgarity 
sf this heroism ought in some degree to diminish its 
/alue. Mr. Colquhoun, in his Police of the Metropo- 
lis, reckons up above 40,000 heroines of this species, 
most of whom, we dare say, have at one time or anoth- 
er reasoned like the sentimental Delphine about the 
judgments of the world. 

To conclude — Our general opinion of this book is, 
that it is calculated to shed a mild lustre over adulte- 
ry ; by gentle and convenient gradation, to destroy the 
modesty and the caution of women : to facilitate the 
acquisition of easy vices, and encumber the difficulty 
of virtue. What a wretched qualification of this cen- 



had not been very dull ! 



(Edinburgh Review, 



MISSION TO ASHANTEE. 
1819.) 

Mission from Cape Coast Castle to Ashantee, with a Sta- 
tistical Account of that Kingdom, and Geographical Notices 
of other Parts of the Interior of Africa. By T. Edward 
Bowdich, Conductor. London, Murray. 1819. 

Cape Coast Castle, or Cape Corso, is a factory of 
Africa, on the Gold Coast. The Portuguese settled 
here in 1610, and built the citadel ; from which, in a 
few years afterwards, they were dislodged by the 
Dutch. In 1661, it was demolished by the English 
under Admiral Holmes ; and by the treaty of Breda, 
it was made over to our government. The latitude of 
Cape Coast Castle is 5 Q 6' north ; the longitude 1° 51' 
west. The capital of the kingdom of Ashantee is 
Coomassie, the latitude of which is about 6° 30' 20'' 
north, and the longitude 2° 6 J 30" west. The mission 
quitted Cape Coast Castle on the 22 d of April, and ar- 
rived at Coomassie about the 16th of May— halting 
two or three days on the route, and walking the whole 
distance, or carried by hammock-bearers at a foot- 
pace. The distance between the fort and the capital 
is not more than 150 miles, or about as far as from 
Durham to Edinburgh ; and yet the kingdom of Ash- 
antee was, before the mission of Mr. Bowdich, almost 
as much unknown to us as if it had been situated in 
some other planet. The country which surrounds 
Cape Coast Castle belongs to the Fantees ; and, about 
the year 1807, an Ashantee army reached the coast 
for the first time. They invaded Fantee again in 
1311, and, for the third time, in 1816. To put a stop to 
the horrible cruelties committed by the stronger on 
the weaker nation ; to secure their own safety, en- 
dangered by the Ashantees ; and to enlarge our know- 
ledge of Africa — the government of Cape Coast Castle 
persuaded the African committee to send a deputation 
to the kingdom of Ashantee ; and of this embassy the 
publication now before us is the narrative. The em- 
bassy walked through a beautilul country, laid waste 
by the recent wars, and arrived in the time we have 
mentioned, and without meeting with any remarkable 
accident, at Coomassie the capital. The account of 
their first reception there we shall lay before our 
readers. 



'We entered Coomassie at two o'clock, passing- under a 
fetish, or sacrifice of a dead sheep, wrapped up in red silk, and 
suspended between two lofty poles. Upwards of 5000 people, 
the greater part warriors, met us with awful bursts of martial 
music, discordant only in its mixture ; for horns, drums, rattles, 
and gong-gongs, were all exerted with a zeal bordering on 
frenzy, to subdue us by the first impression. The smoke which 
encircled us from the incessant discharges of musquetry, con- 
fined our glimpses to the foreground; and we were halted 
whilst the captains performed their Pyrrhic dance, in the centre 
of a circle formed by their warriors ; where a confusion of 
flags, English, Dutch, and Danish, were waved and flourished 
in all directions; the bearers springing from side to side, with 
a passion of enthusiasm only equalled by the captains, dis- 
charging their blunderbusses so close, that the flags now and 
then were in a blaze ; and emerging from the smoke with all 
the gesture and distortion of maniacs. Their followers kept up 
the firing around us in the rear. The dress of the captains was 
a war cap, with gilded rams' horns projecting in front, the 
sides extended beyond all proportion by immense plumes of 
eagles' feathers, and fastened under the chin with bands of 
cowries. Their vest was of red cloth, covered with fetishes 
and saphiti in gold and silver ; and embroidered cases of almost 
every colour, which flapped against their bodies as they 
moved, intermixed with small brass bells, the horns and tails 
of animals, shells and knives; long leopards' tails hung down 
their backs, over a small bow covered with fetishes. They 
wore loose cotton trowsers, with immense boots of a dull red 
leather, coming halfway up the thigh, and fastened by small 
chains to their cartouch or waist belt ; these were also orna- 
mented with bells, horses' tails, strings of amulets, and innu- 
merable shreds of leather; a small quiver of poisoned arrows 
hung from their right wrist, and they held a long iron chain 
between their teeth with a scrap of Moorish writing affixed to 
the end of it. A small spear was in their left hands, covered 



342 



WORKS OF THE REV. SIDNEY SMITH. 



with red cloth ami silk tassels; their black countenances 
heightened the effect of this attire and completed a figure 
scarcely human. 

♦This exhibition continued about half an hour, when we 
were allowed to proceed, encircled by the warriors, whose 
numbers, with the crowds of people, made our movement as 
gradual as if it had taken place in Cheapside ; the several 
streets branching off to the right presented long vistas crammed 
with people ; and those on the left hand being on an acclivity, 
innumerable rows of heads rose one above another : the large 
open porches of the houses, like the fronts of stages in small 
theatres, were filled with the better sort of females and chil- 
dren, all impatient to behold white men for the first time; 
heir exclamations were drowned in the firing and music, but 
their gestures were in character with the scene. When we 
reached the palace, about half a mile from the place where we 
entered, we were again halted, and an open file was made, 
through which the bearers were passed, to deposit the presents 
and baggage in the house assigned to us. Here we were grati- 
fied by observing several of the caboceers (chiefs) pass by with 
their trains, the novel splendour of which astonished us. The 
bands, principally composed of horns and flutes, trained to play 
in concert, seemed to soothe our hearing into its natural tone 
again by their wild melodies ; whilst the immense umbrellas, 
made to sink and rise from the jerkings of the bearers, and 
the large fans waving around, refreshed us with small currents 
of air, under a burning sun, clouds of dust, and a density of 
atmosphere almost suffocating. We were then squeezed, at 
the same funeral pace, up a long street, to an open-fronted 
house, where we were desired by another royal messenger to 
wait a further invitation from the king.' — (pp. 31-33. 

The embassy remained about four months, leaving 
one of their members behind as a permanent resident. 
Their treatment, though subjected to the fluctuating 
passions of barbarians, was, upon the whole, not bad; 
and a foundation appears to have been laid for future 
intercourse with the Ashantees, and a mean opened, 
through them, of becoming better acquainted with 
the interior of Africa. 

The Moors, who seem (barbarians as they are) to 
be the civilizers of internal Africa, have penetrated to 
the capital of the Ashantees : they are bigoted and 
intolerant to Christians, but not sacrificers of human 
victims in their religious ceremonies ; — nor averse to 
commerce ; and civilized in comparison to most of the 
idolatrous natives of Africa. From their merchants 
who resorted from various parts of the interior, Mr. 
Bowdich employed himself in procuring all the geo- 
graphical details which their travels enabled them to 
afford. Timbuctoo they described as inferior to 
Houssa, and not at all comparable to Boornoo. The 
Moorish influence was stated to be powerful in it, but 
not predominant. A small river goes nearly round 
the town, overflowing in the rains, and obliging the 
people of the suburbs to move to an eminence in the 
centre of the town where the king lives. The king, a 
Moorish negro called Billabahada, had a few double- 
barrelled guns, which were fired on great occasions; 
and gunpowder was as dear as gold. Mr. Bowdich 
calculates Houssa to be N. E. from the Niger 20 days' 
journey of 18 miles each day ; and the latitude and 
longitude to be 18° 59' N. and 3 Q 59' E. Boornoo was 
spoken of as the first empire in Africa. The Maho- 
metans of Sennaar reckon it among the four powerful 
empires of the world ; the other three being Turkey, 
Persia, and Abyssinia. 

The Niger is only known to the Moors by the name 
of the Quolla, pronounced as Quorra by the negroes, 
who, from whatever countries they come, all spoke of 
this as the largest river with which they were ac- 
quainted ; and it was the grand feature in all the 
routes to Ashantee, whether from Houssa, Boornoo, 
or the intermediate countries. The Niger, after leav- 
ing the lake Dibbri, was invariably described as divid- 
ing into two large streams ; the Quolla, or the greater 
division, pursuing its course south-eastward, till it 
joined the Bahr Abaid ; and the other branch running 
northward of east, near to Timbuctoo, and dividing 
again soon afterwards — the smaller division running 
northwards by Yahoodee, a place of great trade, and 
the larger running directly eastward, and entering the 
lake Caudi under the name of Gambaroo. ' The 
variety of this concurrent evidence respecting the 
Gambaroo, made an impression on my mind,' says Mr. 
Bowdich, ' almost amounting to conviction.' The 
same author adds, that he found the Moors very 



cautious in their accounts ; declining to speak unless 
they were positive — and frequently referrmg doubtful 
points to others whom they knew to be better ac- 
quainted with them. 

The character of the present king is, upon the 
whole, respectable ; but he is ambitious, has con- 
quered a great deal, and is conquering still. He has 
a love of knowledge ; and was always displeased 
when the European objects which attracted his atten- 
tion were presented to him as gifts. His motives, he 
said, ought to be better understood, and more respect 
paid to his dignity and friendship. He is acute, capri- 
cious, and severe, but not devoid of humanity ; and 
has incurred unpopularity on some occasions, by 
limiting the number of human sacrifices more than 
was compatible with strict orthodoxy. His general 
subjects of discourse with the mission were war, 
legislation, and mechanics. He seemed very desirous 
of standing well in the estimation of his European 
friends ; and put off a conversation once because he 
was a little tipsy, and at another time because he felt 
himself cross and out of temper. 

The king, four aristocratical assessors, and the 
assembly of captains, are the three estates of the 
Ashantee government. The noble quartumvirate, in 
all matters of foreign policy, have a veto on the king's 
decisions. They watch, rather than share, the do- 
mestic administration ; generally influencing it by 
their opinion, rather than controlling it by their au- 
thority. In exercising his judicial functions, the king 
always retires in private with the aristocracy, to hear 
their opinions. The course of succession in Ashantee 
is the brother, the sister's son, the son, and the chief 
slave. 

The king's sisters may marry, or intrigue with any 
person they please, provided he is very strong and 
handsome ; and these elevated and excellent women 
are always ready to set an example of submission to 
the laws of their country. The interest of money is 
about 300 per cent. A man may kill his own slave ; 
or an inferior, for the price of seven slaves. Trifling 
thefts are punished by exposure. The property of the 
wife is distinct from that of the husband — though the 
king is heir to it. Those accused of witchcraft are 
tortured to death. Slaves, if ill treated, are allowed 
the liberty of transferring themselves to other mas- 
ters. 

The Ashantees believe that an higher sort of god 
takes care of the whites, and that they are left to the 
care of an inferior species of deities. Still the black 
kings and black nobility are to go to the upper gods 
after death, where they are to enjoy eternally the 
state and luxury which was their portion on earth. 
For this reason a certain number of cooks, butlers, and 
domestics of every description, are sacrificed on their i 
tombs. They have two sets of priests ; the one dwell 
in the temples, and communicate with the idols ; the 
other species do business as conjurers and cunning: 
men, tell fortunes, and detect small thefts. Half the 
offerings to the idols are (as the priests say) thrown 
into the river, the other half they claim as their own. 
The doors of the temples are, from motives of the 
highest humanity, open to runaway slaves ; but shut, 
upon a fee paid by the master to the priest. Every^ 
person has a small set of household gods, bought of 
the Fetishmen. They please their gods by avoiding- 
particular sorts of meat ; but the prohibited viand HI 
not always the same. Some curry favour by eating no< 
veal ; some protection by avoiding pork ; others say, 
that the real monopoly which the celestials wish to 
establish, is that of beef— and so they piously and pru-i 
dently rush into a course of mutton. They have the 
customary nonsense of lucky days, trial by ordeal, 
and libations and relics. The most horrid and detest- 
able of their customs 16 their sacrifice of human vic- 
tims, and the torture preparatory to it. This takes 
place at all their great festivals, or customs, as they 
are called. Some of these occur every twenty-one 
days ; and there are not fewer than a hundred victim 1 * 
immolated at each. Besides these, there are sacrific 
es at the death of every person of rank, more or lest 
bloody according to their dignity. On the death ol 
his mother, the king butchered no less than three thorn 



ASHANTEE. 



24* 



sand victims; and on his own death this number 
would probably be doubled. The funeral rites of a 
great captain were repeated weekly for three months ; 
and 200 persons, it is said, were slaughtered each time, 
or 2400 hundred in all. The author gives an account 
of the manner of these abominations, in one instance 
of which he was an unwilling spectator. On the fune- 
ral of the mother of Quatchie Quofie, which was by no 
means a great one, — 

'A dash of sheep and rum was exchanged between the king 
and Quatchie Quofie, and the drums announced the sacrifice 
of the victims. All the chiefs first visited them in turn ; I was 
not near enough to distinguish wherefore. The executioners 
wrangled and struggled for the office ; and the indifference 
with which the first poor creature looked on, in the torture he 
was from the knife passed through his cheeks, was remarka- 
ble. The nearest executioner snatched the sword from the 
others, the right hand of the victim was then lopped off, he 
was thrown down, and his head was sawed rather than cut off: 
it was cruelly prolonged, I will not say wilfully. Twelve 
more were dragged forward, but we forced our way through 
the crowd, and retired to our quarters. Other sacrifices, prin- 
cipally female, were made in the bush where the body was bu- 
ried. It is usual to " wet the grave" with the blood of a free- 
man of respectability. All the retainers of the family being 
present, and the heads of all the victims deposited in the bot- 
tom of the grave, several are unsuspectingly called on in a 
hurry to assist in placing the coffin or basket ; and just as it 
rests on the head or skulls, a slave from behind stuns one of 
these freemen by a violent blow, followed by a deep gash in 
the back part of the neck, and he is rolled in on the top of the 
body, and the grave instantly filled up.' — (pp. 287, 288.) 

'About a hundred persons, mostly culprits reserved, are 
generally sacrificed, in different quarters of the town, at this 
custom (that is, at the feast for the new year). Several slaves 
were also sacrificed at Bantama, over the large brass pan, their 
blood mingling with the various vegetable and animal matter 
within (fresh and putrefied), to complete the charm, and pro- 
duce invincible fetish. All the chiefs kill several slaves, that 
their blood may flow into the hole from whence the new yam 
is taken. Those who cannot afford to kill slaves, take the 
head of one already sacrificed, and place it on the hole.' — (p. 
279.) 

The Ashantees are very superior in discipline and 
courage to the water-side Africans : they never pursue 
when it is near sunset ; the general is always in the 
rear, and the fugitives are instantly put to death. The 
army is prohibited, during the active part of the cam- 
paign, from all food but meal, which each man carries 
in a small bag by his side, and mixes in his hands with 
the first water he comes to ; no fires are allowed, lest 
their position should be betrayed; they eat little se- 
lect bits of the first enemy's heart whom they kill ; 
and all wear ornaments of his teeth and bones. 

In their buildings, a mould is made for receiving 
the clay, by two rows of stakes placed at a distance 
equal to the intended thickness of the wall : the inter- 
val is then filled with gravelly clay mixed with water, 
Which, with the outward surface of the frame work, is 
plastered so as to exhibit the appearance of a thick 
mud wall. The captains have pillars which assist to 
support the roof, and forma proscenium, or open front. 
The steps and raised floors of the rooms are clay and 
stone, with a thick layer of red earth, washed and 
painted daily. 

' While the walls are still soft, they formed moulds or frame- 
works of the patterns in delicate slips of cane, connected by 
grass. The two first slips (one end of each being inserted in 
the soft wall) projected the relief, commonly mezzo : the in- 
terstices were then filled up with the plaster, and assumed the 
appearance depicted. The poles or pillars were sometimes 
encircled by twists of cane, intersecting each other, which, 
being filled up with thin plaster, resembled the lozenge and 
cable ornaments of the Anglo-Norman order ; the quatrc-foil 
was very common, and by no means rude, from the symme- 
trical bend of the cane which formed it. I saw a few pillars 
after they had been squared with the plaster), with numerous 
slips of cane pressed perpendicularly on to the wet surface, 
which, being covered again with a very thin coat of plaster, 
closely resembled fluting. When they formed a large arch, 
they inserted one end of a thick piece of cane in the wet clay 
of the floor or base, and, bending the other over, inserted it in 
the same manner ; the entablature was filled up with wattle- 
work plastered over. Arcades and piazzas were common. A 
white wash, very frequently renewed, was made from a clay 
in the neighbourhood. Of course the plastering is very frail, 
and in the relief frequently discloses the edges of the cane, 
fiving, however, a piquant effect, auxiliary to the ornament. 



The doof s were an entire piece of cotton wood, cut with great 
labour out of the stems or buttresses of that tree; battens 
variously cut and painted were afterwards nailed across. So 
disproportionate was the price of labour to that of provision, 
that I gave but two tokoos for a slab of cotton wood, five feet 
by three. The locks they use are from Houssa, and are quite 
original : one will be sent to the British Museum. Where they 
raised a first floor, the under room was divided into two by an 
intersecting wall, to support the ratters for the upper room 
which were generally covered with a frame-work thickly plas- 
tered over with red ochre. I saw but one attempt at flooring 
with plank; it was cotton wood shaped entirely with an adze, 
and looked like a ship's deck. The windows were open wood- 
work, carved in fanciful figures and intricate patterns, and 
painted red ; the frames were frequently cased in gold, about 
as thick as cartridge paper. What surprised me most, and is 
not the least of the many circumstances deciding their great 
superiority over the generality of negroes, was the discovery 
that every house had its cloacoe, besides the common ones for 
the lower orders without the town.' — (pp. 305, 306.) 

The rubbish and offal of each house are burnt every 
morning at the back of the street ; and they are as 
nice in their dwellings as in their persons. The Ash- 
antee loom is precisely on the same principles as the 
English ; the fineness, variety, brilliancy, and size of 
their cloths are astonishing. They paint white 
cloths, not inelegantly, as fast as an European can 
write. They excel in pottery, and are good gold- 
smiths. Their weights are very neat brass casts of 
almost every animal, fruit, and vegetable, known in 
the country. The king's scales, blow-pan, boxes, 
weights, and pipe-tongs were neatly made of the pur- 
est gold. They work finely in iron, tan leather, and 
are excellent carpenters. 

Mr. Bowdich computes the number of men capable 
of bearing arms to be 204,000. The disposable force 
is 150,000 ; the population a million ; the number of 
square miles 14,000. Polygamy is tolerated to the 
greatest extent ; the king's allowance is 3333 wives ; 
and the full compliment is always kept up. Four of 
the principal streets in Coomassie are half a mile long, 
and from 50 to 100 yards wide. The streets were all 
named, and a superior captain in charge of each. The 
street where the mission was lodged was called Appe- 
remsoo, or Cannon Street ; another street was called 
Daebrim, or Great Market Street; another, Prison 
Street, and so on. A plan of the town is giveu. The 
Ashantees persisted in saying that the population of 
Coomassie was above 100,000 ; but this is thought, by 
the gentlemen of the mission, to allude rather to the 
population collected on great occasions, than the per- 
manent residents, not computed by them at more than 
15,000. The markets were daily ; and the articles for 
sale, beef, mutton, wild-hog, deer, monkeys' flesh, 
fowls, yams, plain tains, corn, sugar-cane, rice, pep- 
pers, vegetable butter, oranges, papans, pine-apples, 
bananas, salt and dried fish, large snails smoke-dried ; 
palm wine, rum, pipes, beads, looking-glasses ; san- 
dals, silk, cotton cloth, powder, small pillars, white 
and blue thread, and calabashes. The cattle in Ash- 
antee are as large as English cattle ; their sheep are 
hairy. They have no implement but the hoe ; have 
two crops of corn in the year ; plant their yams at 
Christmas, and dig them up in September. Their 
plantations, extensive and orderly, have the appear- 
ance of hop gardens well fenced in, and regularly 
planted in lines, with a broad walk around, and a hut 
at each wicker-gate, where a slave and his family re- 
side to protect the plantation. All the fruits mention- 
ed as sold in the market grow in spontaneous abund- 
ance, as did the sugar-cane. The oranges were of a 
large size and exquisite flavour. There were no cocoa 
trses. The berry which gives to acids the flavour of 
sveets, making limes taste like honey, is common 
here. The castor-oil plant rises to a large tree. 
The cotton tree sometimes rises to the height of 150 
feet. 

The great obstacle to the improvement of commeroe 
with the Ashantee people (besides the jealousy natu- 
ral to barbarians) is our rejection of the slave trade, 
and the continuance of that detestable traffic by the 
Spaniards. While the mission was in that country, 
one thousand slaves left Ashantee for two Spanish 
schooners on the coast. — How is an African monarch 
to be taught that he has not a right to turn human 



244 



WORKS OF THE REV. SIDNEY SMITH 



creatures into rum and tobacco ? or that the nation 
which prohibits such an intercourse are not his ene- 
mies ? To have free access to Ashantee would com- 
mand Dagwumba. The people of Inta and Dagwum- 
ba being commercial, rather than warlike, an inter- 
course with them would be an intercourse with the 
interior, as far as Timbuctoo and Houssa northwards, 
arid Cassina, if not Boornoo, eastwards. 

After the observations of Mr. Bowdich, senior offi- 
cer of the mission, follows the narrative of Mr. Hutch- 
ison, left as charge-d'affaires, upon the departure of 
the other gentlemen. Mr. Hutchinson mentions some 
white men residing at Yenne, whom he supposes to 
have been companions of Park ; and Ali Baba, a man 
of good character and consideration, upon the eve of 
departure from these regions, assured him, that there 
were two Europeans then resident at Timbuctoo.— In 
his observations on the river Gaboon, Mr. Bowdich has 
the following information on the present state of the 
slave trade : — 

1 Three Portuguese, one French, and two large Spanish 
ships, visited the river for slaves during our stay ; and the 
master of a Liverpool vessel assured me that he had fallen 
in with twenty-two between Gaboon and the Congo. Their 
grand rendezvous is Mayumba. The Portuguese of St. 
Thomas's and Prince's Islands, send small schooner boats 
to Gaboon for slaves, which are kept, after they are trans- 
ported this short distance, until the coast is clear for ship- 
ping them to America. A third large Spanish ship, well 
armed, entered the river the night before we quitted it, and 
hurried our exit, for one of that character was committing 
piracy in the neighbouring river. Having suffered from 
falling into their hands before, I felicitated myself on the 
escape. We were afterwards chased and boarded by a 
■Spanish armed schooner, with three hundred slaves on 
board ; they only desired provisions.' 

These are the most important extracts from this 
publication, which is certainly of considerable impor- 
tance, from the account it gives us of a people hitherto 
almost entirely unknown ; and from the light which 
the very diligent and laborious inquiries of Mr. Bow- 
dich has thrown upon the geography of Africa, and 
the probability held out to us of approaching the great 
kingdoms on the Niger, by means of an intercourse by 
no means difficult to be established with the kingdoms 
of Inta and Dagwumba. The river Volta flows into 
the Gulf of Guinea, inlatitude 7°north. It is navigable, 
and by the natives navigated for ten days, to Odentee. 
Now, from Odentee to Sallagha, the capital of the* 
kingdom of Inta, is but four days' journey ; and seven 
days' journey from Sallagha, through the Inta Jam of 
Zengoo, is Yahndi, the capital of Dagwumba. Yahn- 
di is described to be beyond comparison larger than 
Coomassie, the houses much better built and orna- 
mented. The Ashantees who had visited it, told Mr. 
Bowdich they had frequently lost themselves in the 
streets. The king has been converted bj r the Moors, 
who have settled themselves there in great numbers. 
Mr. Lucas calls it the Mahometan kingdom of Degom- 
ba ; and it was represented to him as peculiarly weal- 
thy and civilized. The markets of Yahndi are de- 
scribed as animated scenes of commerce, constantly 
crowded with merchants from almost all the countries 
of the interior. It seems to us, that the best way of 
becoming acquainted with Africa, is not to plan such 
sweeping expeditions as have been lately sent out by 
government, but to submit to become acquainted with 
it by degrees, and to acquire by little and little a 
knowledge of the best methods of arranging expedi- 
tions. The kingdom of Dagwumba, for instance, is 
not 200 miles from a well-known and regular water- 
eamage, on the Volta. Perhaps it is nearer, but the 
distance is not greater than this. It is one of the most 
commercial nations in Africa, and one of the most 
civilized ; and yet it is utterly unknown, except by 
report, to Europeans. Then why not plan an expedi- 
tion to Dagwumba ? — the expense of which would be 
very trifling, and the issue known in three or four 
months. The information procured from such a wise 
and moderate undertaking, would enable any future 
mission to proceed with much greater ease and safety 
into the interior ; or prevent them from proceeding, as 
they hitherto have done, to their own destruction. 



We strongly believe, with Mr. Bowdich, that this is 
the right road to the Niger. 

Nothing in this world is created in vain: lions 
tigers, conquerors, have their use. Ambitious mon- 
archs, who are the curse of civilized nations, are the 
civilizers of savage people. With a number of little 
independent hordes, civilization is impossible. They 
must have a common interest before there can be 
peace ; and be directed by one will before there can 
be order. When mankind are prevented from daily 
quarrelling and fighting, they first begin to improve 
and all this, we are afraid, is only to be accomplished, 
in the first instance, by some great conqueror. We 
sympathise, therefore, with the victories of the King 
of Ashantee — and feel ourselves in love, for the first 
time, with military glory. The ex-emperor of the 
French would, at Coomassie, Dagwumba, or Inta, be 
an eminent benefactor to the human race. 



PUBLIC CHARACTERS OF 1801, 1802. (Edin- 
burgh Review, 1802.) 

Public Characters of 1801— 1802. Richard Phillips, St. Paul's 
1 vol. 8vo. 

The design of this book appeared to us so extremely 
reprehensible, and so capable, even in the hands of a 
blockhead, of giving pain to families and individuals, 
that we considered it as a fair object of literary police, 
and had prepared for it a very severe chastisement. 
Upon the perusal of the book, however, we were en- 
tirely disarmed. It appears to be written by some 
very innocent scribbler, who feels himself under the 
necessity of dining, and who preserves, throughout the 
whole of the work, that degree of good humour which 
the terror of indictment by our lord the king is so well 
calculated to inspire. It is of some importance, too, 
that the grown-up country gentlemen should be habi- 
tuated to read printed books ; and such may read a 
story about their living iriends, who would read no- 
thing else. 

We suppose the booksellers have authors at two 
different prices : — those who write grammatically, and 
those who do not ; and that they have not thought fit 
to put any of their best hands upon this work. Whe- 
ther or not there may be any improvement on this 
point in the next volume, we request the biographer 
will at least give us some means of ascertaining when 
he is comical, and when serious. In the life of Dr. 
Rennell we find this passage : — 

' Dr. Rennell might well look forward to the highest dignities 
in the establishment ; but, if our information be right, and we 
have no reason to question it, this is what he by no means 
either expects or courts. There is a primitive simplicity in 
this excellent man, which much resembles that of the first pre- 
lates of the Christian church, who were with great difficulty 
prevailed upon to undertake the episcopal office.' 



ACCOUNT OF NEW SOUTH WALES. (Edik- 

burgh Review, 1803.) 

Account of the English Colony of New South Walet. By 
Lieutenant-Colonel Collins, of the Royal Marines. Vol. 
II. 4to. Cadell and Davies, London. 

To introduce an European population, and, conse- 
quently, the arts and civilization of Europe, into such 
an untrodden country as New Holland, is to confer a 
lasting and important benefit upon the world. If man 
be destined foi perpetual activity, and if the proper 
objects of that activity be the subjugation of physical 
difficulties, and of his own dangerous passions, how 
absurd are those systems which proscribe the acquisi- 
tions of science and the restraints of law, and would 
arrest the progress of man in the rudest and earliesi 
stages of his existence ! Indeed, opinions so very ex- 
travagant in their nature, must be attributed rather to 
the wautonness of paradox, than to sober reflection 
and extended inquiry. 

To suppose the savage state permanent, we must 
suppose the numbers of those who compose it to be 



ACCOUNT OF NEW SOUTH WALES. 



245 



stationary, and the various passions by which men 
nave actually emerged from it to be extinct ; and this 
is to suppose man a very different being from what he 
really is. To prove such a permanence beneficial (if 
it were possible), we must have recourse to matter of 
fact, and judge of the rude state of society, not from 
the praises of tranquil literati, but from the narratives 
of those who have seen it, through a nearer and better 
medium than that of imagination. There is an argu- 
ment, however, for the continuation of evil, drawn 
from the ignorance of good; by which it is contended, 
that to teach men their situation can be better, is to 
teach them that it is bad, and to destroy that happi- 
ness which always results from an ignorance that any 
greater happiness is within our reach. All pains and 
pleasures are clearly by comparison ; but the most de- 
plorable savage enjoys a sufficient contrast of good, to 
know that the grosser evils from which civilization 
rescues him are evils. A New Hollander seldom pass- 
es a year without suffering from famine ; the small-pox 
falls upon him like a plague ; he dreads those calami- 
ties, though he does not know how to avert them ; but 
doubtless would find his happiness increased, if they 
were averted. To deny this, is to suppose that men 
are reconciled to evils, because they are inevitable ; — 
and yet hurricanes, earthquakes, bodily decay, and 
death, stand highest in the catalogue of human calam- 
ities. 

Where civilization gives birth to new comparisons 
unfavourable to savage life, with the information that 
a greater good is possible, it generally connects the 
means of attaining it. The savage no sooner becomes 
ashamed of his nakedness, than the loom is ready to 
clothe him ; the forge prepares for him more perfect 
tools, when he is disgusted with the awkwardness of 
his own : his weakness is strengthened, and his wants 
supplied, as soon as they are discovered ; and the use 
of the discovery is, that it enables him to derive from 
comparison the best reasons for present happiness. A 
man born blind is ignorant of the pleasures of which 
he is deprived. After the restoration of his sight, his 
happiness will be increased from two causes ; — from 
the delight he experiences at the novel accession of 
power, and from the contrast he will always be enabled 
to make between his two situations, long after the 
pleasure of novelty has ceased. For these reasons it 
is humane to restore him to sight. 

But, however beneficial to the general interests of 
mankind the civilization of barbarous countries may 
be considered to be, in this particular instance of it, 
the interest of Great Britain would seem to have been 
very little consulted. With fanciful schemes of uni- 
versal good we have no business to meddle. Why we 
are to erect penitentiary houses and prisons at the dis- 
tance of half the diameter of the globe, and to incur 
the enormous expense of feeding and transporting their 
inhabitants to, and at such a distance, it is extremely 
difficult to discover.* It certainly is not from any de- 
ficiency of barren islands near our own coast, nor of 
uncultivated wastes in the interior ; and if we were 
sufficiently fortunate to be wanting in such species of 
accommodation, we might discover in Canada, or the 
West Indies, or on the coast of Africa, a climate ma- 
lignant enough, or a soil sufficiently sterile, to revenge 
all the injuries which have been inflicted on society by 
pickpockets, larcenists, and petty felons. Upon the 
foundation of a new colony, and especially one peopled 
by criminals, there is a disposition in government 
(where any circumstance in the commission of the 
crime affords the least pretence for the commutation) 
to convert capital punishments into transportation ; — 
and by these means to hold forth a very dangerous, 
though certainly a very unintentional, encouragement 
to offences. And when the history of the colony has 
been attentively perused in the parish of St. Giles, the 
ancient avocation of picking pockets will certainly not 
become more discreditable from the knowledge, that 
it may eventually lead to the possession of a farm of a 
thousand acres on the river Hawkesbury. Since the 

* The transportation committee of last year in their re- 
port arrive at the same conclusion, but not till after 
7,000, OOflfc. had been spent in the ."atperiment. I 



benevolent Howard attacked our prisons, incarcera- 
tion has become not only healthy but elegant ; and a 
county jail is precisely the place to which any pauper 
might wish to retire to gratify his taste for magnifi- 
cence, as well as for comfort. Upon the same princi- 
ple, there is some risk that transportation will be 
considered as one of the surest roads to honour and to 
wealth ; and that no felon will hear a verdict of t not 
guilty,' without considering himself as cut off in the 
fairest career of prosperity. It is foolishly believed, 
that the colony of Botany Bay unites our moral and 
commercial interests, and that we shall receive here- 
after an ample equivalent, in bales of goods, for all the 
vices we export. Unfortunately, the expense we have 
incurred in founding the colony will not retard the nat- 
ural progress of its emancipation, or prevent the at- 
tacks of other nations, who will be as desirous of 
reaping the fruit, as if they had sown the seed. It is 
a colony, besides, begun under every possible disad- 
vantage : it is too distant to be long governed, or well 
defended: it is undertaken, not by the voluntary asso- 
ciation of individuals, but by government, and by 
means of compulsory labour. A nation must, indeed, 
be redundant in capital, that will expend it where the 
hopes of a just return as so very small. 

It may be a curious consideration, to reflect what we 
are to do with this colony when it comes to years of 
discretion. Are we to spend another hundred millions 
of money in discovering its strength, and to humble 
ourselves again before a fresh set of Washingtons and 
Franklins? The moment after we have suffered such se- 
rious mischief from the escape of the old tiger, we are 
breeding up a young cub, whom we cannot render less 
ferocious, or more secure. If we are gradually to 
manumit the colony, as it is more and more capable of 
protecting itself, the degrees of emancipation, and the 
periods at which they are to take place, will be judged 
of very differently by the two nations. But we confess 
ourselves not to be so sanguine as to suppose, that a 
spirited commercial people would, in spite of the ex- 
ample of America, ever consent to abandon their sov- 
reignty over an important colony, without a struggle. 
Endless blood and treasure will be exhausted to sup- 
port a tax on kangaroos' skins : faithful Commons will 
go on voting fresh supplies to support a just and necessa- 
ry war; and Newgate, then become a quarter of the 
world, will evince a heroism, not unworthy of the 
great characters by whom she was originally peopled. 

The experiment, however, is not less interesting in 
a moral, because it is objectionable in a commercial 
point of view. It is an object of the highest curiosity, 
thus to have the growth of a nation subjected to our 
examination ; to trace it by such faithful records, from 
the first day of its existence ; and to gather that know- 
ledge of the progress of human affairs, from actual 
experience, which is considered to be only accessible 
to the conjectural reflections of enlightened minds. 

Human nature, under very old governments, is so 
trimmed, and pruned, and ornamented, and led into 
such a variety of factitious shapes, that we are almost 
ignorant of the appearance it would assume, if it were 
left more to itself. From such an experiment as that 
now before us, we shall be better able to appreciate 
what circumstances of our situation are owing to those 
permanent laws by which all men are influenced, and 
what to the accidental positions in which we have been 
placed. New circumstances will throw new light upon 
the effects of our religious, political, and economical 
institutions, if we cause them to be adopted as models 
in our rising empire ; and if we do not, we shall esti- 
mate the effects of their presence, by observing those 
which are produced by their non-existence. 

The history of the colony is at present, however, in 
its least interesting state, on account of the great pre- 
ponderance of depraved inhabitants, whose crimes and 
irregularities give a monotony to the narrative, which 
it cannot lose, till the respectable part of the commu- 
nity come to bear a greater proportion to the criminal. 

These Memoirs of Colonel Collins resume the history 
of the colony froifti the period at which he concluded 
it in his former volume, September, 1796, and continue 
it down to August, 1801. They are written in the 
style of a journal, which, though not the most agreea- 



246 



WORKS OF THE REV. SIDNEY SMITH. 



ble mode of conveying information, is certainly the 
most authentic, and contrives to banish the suspicion 
(and most probably the reality) of the interference of 
a book-maker — a species of gentlemen who are now 
almost become necessary to deliver naval and military 
authors in their literary labours, though they do not 
always atone, by orthography and grammar, for the 
sacrifice of truth and simplicity. Mr. Collins's book 
is written with great plainness and candour : he ap- 
pears to be a man always meaning well ; of good, 
plain, common sense ; and composed of those well- 
wearing materials, which adapt a person for situations 
where genius and refinement would only prove a source 
of misery and of error. 

We shall proceed to lay before our readers an analy- 
sis of the most important matter contained in this 
volume. 

The natives in the vicinity of Port Jackson stand 
extremely low, in point of civilization, when compar- 
ed with many other savages, with whom the disco- 
veries of Captain Cook have made us acquainted. 
Their notions of religion exceed even that degree of 
absurdity which we are led to expect in the creed of a 
barbarous people. In politics, they appear to have 
scarcely advanced beyond family government. Huts 
they have none : and. in all their economical inven- 
tions, there is a rudeness and deficiency of ingenuity, 
unpleasant, when contrasted with the instances of dex- 
terity with which the descriptions and importations 
of our navigators have rendered us so familiar. Their 
numbers appear to us to be very small : a fact at once 
indicative either of the ferocity of manners in any 
people, or more probably of the sterility of their 
country ; but which, in the present instance, proceeds 
from both these causes. 

' Gaining every day (says Mr. Collins) some further know- 
ledge of the inhuman habits and customs of these people, their 
being so thinly scattered through the country ceased to be a 
matter of surprise. It was almost daily seen, that from some 
trifling cause or other, they were continually living in a state 
of warfare: to this must be added, their brutal treatment of 
their women, who are themselves equally destructive to the 
measure of population, by the horrid and cruel custom of en- 
deavouring to cause a miscarriage, which their female acquaint- 
ance effect by pressing the body in such a way as to destroy 
the infant in the womb ; which violence not unfrequently oc- 
casions the death of the unnatural mother also. To this they 
have recourse, to avoid the trouble of carrying the infant about 
when born, which, when it is very young, or at the breast, is 
the duty of the woman. The operation for this destructive 
purpose is termed Mee-bra. The burying an infant (when at 
the breast) with the mother, if she should die, is another shock- 
ing cause of the thinness of population among them. The fact, 
that such an operation as the Mee-bra was practised by these 
wretched people, was communicated by one of the natives to 
the principal surgeon of the settlement.' — (pp. 124, 125.) 

It is remarkable, that the same paucity of numbers 
has been observed in every part of New Holland 
which has hitherto been explored ; and yet there is 
not the smallest reason to conjecture that the popula- 
tion of it has been very recent ; nor do the people 
bear any marks of descent from the inhabitants of the 
numerous islands by which this great continent is sur- 
rounded. The force of population can only be resisted 
by some great physical evils ; and many of the causes 
of this scarcity of human beings, which Mr. Collins 
refers to the ferocity of the natives, are ultimately re- 
ferable to the difficulty of support. We have always 
considered this phenomenon as a symptom extremely 
unfavourable to the future destinies of this country. 
It is easy to launch out into eulogiums of the fertility 
of nature in particular spots ; but the most probable 
reason why a country that has been long inhabited is 
not well inhabited is, that it is not calculated to sus- 
port many inhabitants without great labour. It is 
difficult to suppose any other causes powerful enough 
to resist the impetuous tendency of man, to obey that 
mandate for increase and multiplication, which has 
certainly been better observed than any other declara- 
tion of the Divine will ever revealed to us. 

There appears to be some tendency to civilization, 
and some tolerable notions of justice, in a practice 
very similar to our custom of duelling ; for duelling, 
thowgh barbarous in civilized, is a highly civilized in- 



stitution among barbarous people ; and ? when com* 
pared to assassination, is a prodigious victory gained 
over human passions. Whoever kills another in the 
neighbourhood of Botany Bay is compelled to appear 
at an appointed day before the friends of the deceas 
ed, and to sustain the attacks of their missile weapons. 
If he is killed, he is deemed to have met with a de- 
served death ; if not, he is considered to have expiated 
the crime, for the commission of which he was exposed 
to the danger. There is, in this institution, a com- 
mand over present impulses, a prevention of secrecy 
in the gratification of revenge, and a wholesome cor- 
rection of that passion by the effects of public obser- 
vation, which evince such a superiority to the mere 
animal passions of ordinary savages, and form such a 
contrast to the rest of the history of this people, that 
it may be considered as altogether an anomalous and 
inexplicable fact. The natives differ very much in the 
progress they have made in the arts of economy. 
Those to the north of Port Jackson evince a consider- 
able degree of ingenuity and contrivance in the struc- 
ture of their houses, which are rendered quite imper- 
vious to the weather, while the inhabitants at Port 
Jackson have no houses at all. At Port Dalrymple, 
in Van Diemen's Land, there was every reason to be- 
lieve the natives were unacquainted with the use of 
canoes ; a fact extremely embarrassing to those who 
indulge themselves in speculating on the genealogy of 
nations ; because it reduces them U the necessity of 
supposing that the progenitors of cms insular people 
swam over from the mainland, or that they were 
aboriginal ; a species of dilemma, which effectually 
bars all conjecture upon the intermixture of nations. 
It is painful to learn, that the natives have begun to 
plunder and rob in so very alarming a manner, that it 
has been repeatedly found necessary to fire upon 
them ; and many have, in consequence, fallen victims 
to their rashness. 

The soil is found to produce coal in vast abundance, 
salt, lime, very fine iron ore, timber fit for all pur- 
poses, excellent flax, and a tree, the bark of which is 
admirably adapted for cordage. The discovery of 
coal (which, by the bye, we do not believe was ever 
before discovered so near the line,) is probably rather 
a disadvantage than an advantage ; because, as it lies 
extremely favourable for sea-carriage, it may prove 
to be a cheaper fuel than wood, and thus operate as a 
discouragement to the clearing of lands. The soil 
upon the sea-coast has not been found to be very pro- 
ductive, though it improves in partial spots in the 
mterior. The climate is healthy, in spite of the pro- 
digious heat of the summer months ; at which period 
the thermometer has been observed to stand in the 
shade at 107, and the leaves of garden vegetables to 
fall into dust, as if they had been consumed with fire. 
But one of the most insuperable defects in New Hol- 
land, considered as the future country of a great peo- 
ple, is the want of large rivers penetrating very far 
into the interior, and navigable for small craft. The 
Hawkesbury, Jie largest river yet discovered, is not 
accessible to boats for more than twenty miles. The 
same river occasionally rises above its natural level, 
to the astonishing height of fifty feet ; and has swept 
away, more than once, the labours and the hopes of 
the new people exiled to its banks. 

The laborious acquisition of any good we have long 
enjoyed is apt to be forgotten. We walk and talk, 
and run and read, without remembering the long and 
severe labour dedicated to the cultivation of these 
powers, the formidable obstacles opposed to our pro- 
gress, or the infinite satisfaction with which we over- 
came them. He who lives among a civilized people 
may estimate the labour by which society has been 
brought into such a state, by reading in these annals 
of Botany Bay, the account of a whole nation exerting 
itself to new- floor the government-house, repair the 
hospital, or build a wooden receptacle for stores. 
Yet the time may come, when some Botany Bay Taci- 
tus shall record the crimes of an emperor lineally 
descended from a London pickpocket, or paint the 
valour with which he has led his New Hollanders into 
the heart of China. At that period, when the Grand 
Lahma is sending to supplicate alliance ; when the 



ACCOUNT OF NEW SOUTH WALES. 



*47 



Spice Islands are purchasing peace with nutmegs; 
when enormous tributes of green tea and nankeen are 
wafted into Port Jackson, and landed on the quays of 
Sidney ; who will ever remember, that the sawing of 
a few planks, and the knocking together a few nails, 
were such a serious trial of the energies and resources 
of a nation ? 

The government of the colony, after enjoying some 
little respite from this kind of labour, has begun to 
turn its attention to the coarsest and most necessary 
species of manufactures, for which their wool appears 
to be extremely well adapted. The state of stock in 
the whole settlement, in June, 1801, was about 7000 
sheep. 1300 head of cattle, 250 horses, and 5000 hogs. 
There' were under cultivation at the same time be- 
tween 9000 and 10,000 acres of corn. Three years and 
a half before this, in December, 1797, the numbers 
were as follows -.—Sheep, 2500 ; cattle, 350 ; horses, 
100 ; hogs, 4300 ; acres of land in cultivation, 4000. 
The temptation to salt pork, and sell it for govern- 
ment store, is probably the reason why the breed of 
hogs has been so much kept under. The increase of 
cultivated lands between the two periods is prodigious. 
It appears (p. 319), that the whole number of convicts 
imported between January, 1788, and June, 1801 (a 
period of thirteen years and a half), has been about 
5000, of whom 1157 were females. The total amount 
of the population on the continent, as well as at Nor- 
folk Island, amounted, June, 1801, to 6500 persons ; of 
these 766 were children born at Port Jackson. In the 
returns from Norfolk Island, children are not discrim- 
inated from adults. Let us add to the imported popu- 
lation of 5000 convicts, 500 free people, which (if we 
consider that a regiment of soldiers has been kept up 
there), is certainly a very small allowance ; then, in 
thirteen years and a half, the imported population has 
increased only by two-thirteenths. If we suppose that 
something more than a fifth of the free people were 
women, this will make the total of women 1270 ; of- 
whom we may fairly presume that 800 were capable 
of child-bearing ; and if we suppose the children of 
Norfolk Island to bear the same proportion to the 
adults as at Port Jackson, their total number at both 
settlements will be 913 : — a state of infantine popula- 
tion which certainly does not justify the very high eu- 
logiums which have been made on the fertility of the 
female sex in the climate of New Holland. 

The governor, who appears on all occasions to be 
an extremely well-disposed man, is not quite so con- 
versant in the best writings on political economy as 
we could wish; and indeed, (though such knowledge 
would be extremely serviceable to the interests which 
this Romulus of the Southern Pole is superintending), 
it is rather unfair to exact from a superintendant of 
pick-pockets, that he should be a philosopher. In the 
18th page we have the following information respect- 
ing the price of labour. 

' Some representations having been made to the governor 
from the settlers in different parts of the colony, purporting, 
that the wagesdemanded by the free labouring people, whom 
they had to hire, were so exorbitant as to run away with 
the greatest part of the profit of their farms, it was recom- 
mended to them to appoint quarterly meetings among them- 
selves, to be held in each district for the purpose of settling 
the rate of wages to labourers in every different kind of 
work ; that, to this end, a written agreement should be en- 
tered into, and subscribed by each settler, a breach of which 
should be punished by a penalty, to be fixed by the general 
opinion, and made recoverable in a court of civil judica- 
ture. It was recommended to them to apply this forfeiture 
to the common benefit ; and they were to transmit to the 
head-quarters a copy of their agreement, with the rate of 
wages which they should from time to time establish, for the 
governor's information ; holding their first meeting as early 
as possible.' 

And again, at p. 24, the following arrangements on 
that head are enacted : — 

* In pursuance of the order which was issued in January 
last, recommending the settlers to appoint meetings, at 
which they should fix the rate of wages that it might be pro- 
per to pay for the different kinds of labour which their 
farms should require, the settlers had met and submitted to 
Hhe governor the several resolutions they had entered into, 



by which he was enabled to fix a rate that he conceived to 
be fair and equitable between the farmer and the labourer. 

* The following prices of labour were now established 
viz. . — 

£ s. d. 
Felling forest timber, per acre - - - - 9 
Do. in brush ground. do. - - - - 10 6 

Burning off open ground, do. - - - -150 
Do. brush ground, do. - - 1 10 

Breaking up new ground, do. - 1 4 

Chipping fresh ground, do. - - - - 12 3 
Chipping in wheat, do. - - - -070 

Breaking up stubble or corn ground, l£d per rod, 

or do 16 S 

Planting Indian corn, do. - - - - 7 

Hilling do. do 7 

Reaping wheat, do. - - - - 10 

Thrashing do. per bushel, do. - - - - 9 

Pulling and husking Indian corn, per bushel - 6 
Splitting paling of 7 feet long, per hundred - - 3 
Do. of 5 feet long, do. - - - 1 G 

Sawing plank, do. - - - 7 

Ditching per rod, 3 feet wide and 3 feet deep - 10 
Carriage of wheat, per bushel, per mile - - 2 
Do. Indian corn, neat - - - - - -003 

Yearly wages for labour, with board - - - 10 
Wages per week, with provisions, consisting of 

41b of salt pork, or 61b of fresh, and 211b. of 

wheat with vegetables - - - - -060 

A day's wages with board - - - - -010 

Do. without board - - - - - - -026 

A government-man allowed to officers or settlers 

in their own time - - - - - -00 10 

Price of an axe - - - - - - -020 

New steeling do. - - - - - - -006 

A new hoe - - - - - - - -019 

A sickle ---------016 

Hire of a boat to carry grain, per day - - -050 

' The settlers were reminded, that, in order to prevent 
any kind of dispute between the master and servant, when 
they should have any occasion to hire a man for any length 
of time, they would find it most convenient to engage him 
for a quarter, half year, or year, and to make their agree- 
ment in writing ; on which, should any dispute arise, an 
appeal to the magistrates would settle it.' 

This is all very bad ; and if the governor had cher- 
ished the intention of destroying the colony, he could 
have done nothing more detrimental to it's interests. 

The high price of labour is the very corner-stone 
on which the prosperity of a new colony depends. It 
enables the poor man to live with ease ; and is the 
strongest incitement to population, by rendering chil- 
dren rather a source of riches than of poverty. If the 
same difficulty of subsistence existed in new countries 
as in old, it is plain that the progress of population 
would be equally slow in each. The very circum- 
stances which cause the difference is, that in the lat- 
ter, there is a competition among the labourers em- 
ployed ; and, in the former, a competition among the 
occupiers of land to obtain labourers. In the one, 
land is scarce, and men plenty; in the other, men are 
scarce, and land is plenty. To disturb this natural 
order of things, a practice injurious at all times, must 
be particularly so, where the predominant disposition 
of the colonists is an aversion to labour, produced by 
a long course of dissolute habits. In such cases, the 
high prices of labour, which the governor was so de- 
sirous of abating, bid fair not only to increase the 
agricultural prosperity, but to effect the moral refor- 
mation of the colony. We observe the same unfortu- 
nate ignorance of the elementary principles of com- 
merce, in the attempts of the governor to reduce the 
prices of the European commodities, by bulletins and 
authoritative interference, as if there were any other 
mode of lowering the price of an article (while the 
demand continues the same) but by increasing in 
quantity. The avaricious love of gain, which is so 
feelingly deplored, appears to us a principle which, in 
able hands, might be guided to the most salutary 
purposes. The object is to encourage the love of la- 
bour, which is best encouraged by the love of money. 
We have very great doubts on the policy of reserving 
the best timber on the estates as government timber. 
Such a reservation would probably operate as a check 
upon the clearing of lands, without attaining the ob- 
ject desired; for the timber, instead of being immedi- 
ately cleared, would be slowly destroyed, by the neg- 



WORKS OF THE REV. SIDNEY SMITH. 



lect or malice of the settlers whose lands it encum- 
bered. Timber is such a drug in new countries, that 
it is at any time to be purchased for little more than 
the labour of cutting. To secure a supply of it by 
vexatious and invidious laws is surely a work of su- 
pererogation and danger. The greatest evil which 
the government has yet had to contend with is, the 
inordinate use of spirituous liquors ; a passion which 
puts the interests of agriculture at variance with those 
of morals ; for a dram-drinker will consume as much 
corn, in the form of alcohol, in one day, as would sup- 
ply him with bread for three ; and thus, by his vices, 
opens a market to the industry of a new settlement. 
The only mode, we believe, of encountering this evil, 
is by deriving from it such a revenue as will not admit 
of smuggling. Beyond this, it is almost invincible by 
authority; and is probably to be cured only by the 
progressive refinement of manners. 

To evince the increasing commerce of the settle- 
ment, a list is subjoined of one hundred and forty 
ships which have arrived there since its first founda- 
tion; forty only of which were from England. The co- 
lony at Norfolk Island is represented to be in a very 
deplorable situation, and will most probably be aban- 
doned for one about to be formed on Van Dieman's 
Land,* though the capital defect of the former settle- 
ment has been partly obviated, by a discovery of the 
harbour for small craft. 

The most important and curious information con- 
tained in this volume, is the discovery of straits which 
separate Van Dieman's Land (hitherto considered as 
its southern extremity) from New Holland. For this 
discovery we are indebted to Mr. Bass, a surgeon, af- 
ter whom the straits have been named, and who was 
led to a suspicion of their existence by a prodigious 
swell which he observed to set in from the westward, 
at the mouth of the opening which he had reached on 
a voyage of discovery, prosecuted in a common whale 
boat. To verify this suspicion, he proceeded after- 
wards in a vessel of 25 tons, accompanied by Mr. 
Flinders, a naval gentleman ; and entering the straits 
between the latitudes of 39 ° and 40 ° south, actually 
circumnavigated Van Dieman's Land. Mr. Bass's 
ideas of the importance of this discovery we shall 
give from his narrative, as reported by Mr. Collins. 

' The most prominent advantage which seemed likely to ac- 
crue to the settlement from this discovery was, the expediting 
of the passage from the Cape of Good Hope to Port Jackson ; 
for although a line drawn from the Cape to 44° of south lati- 
tude, and to longitude of the South the Cape of Van Dieman's 
Land, would not sensibly differ from one drawn to the latitude 
of 40°, to the same longitude; yet it must be allowed, that a 
ship will be four degrees nearer to Port Jackson in the latter 
situation than it would be in the former. But there is, perhaps, 
a greater advantage to be gained by making a passage through 
the strait than the mere saving of four degrees of latitude 
along the coast. The major part of the ships that have arrived 
at Port Jackson have met with N. E. winds, on opening the sea 
round the South Cape and Cape Pillar, and have been so much 
retarded by them, that a fourteen days' passage to the port is 
reckoned to be a fair one, although the difference of latitude is 
but ten degrees, and the most prevailing winds at the latter 
place are from S. E. to S. in summer, and from W.S. W. to S. 
in winter. If, by going through Bass Strait, these N. E. winds 
can be avoided, which in many cases would probably be the 
case, there is no doubt but a week or more would be gained by 
it; and the expense, with the wear and tear of a ship for one 
week, are objects to most owners, more especially when 
freighted with convicts by the run. 

' This strait likewise presents another advantage. From the 
prevalence of the N.E. and easterly winds off the South Cape, 
many suppose that a passage may be made from thence to the 
westward, either to the Capejjof Good Hope, or to India; but 
the fear of the great unknown bight between the South Cape 
ofLewen'sLand, lying in about 35° south "and 113° east, has 
hitherto prevented the trial being made. Now, the strait re- 
moves a part of this danger, by presenting a certain place of 
retreat, should a gale oppose itself to the ship in the first part 
of the essay ; and should the wind come at S.W. she need not 
fear making a good stretch to the W.N.W. ; which course, if 
made good, is within a few degrees of going clear of all. 
There is, besides, King George the Third's Sound, discovered 

* It is singular that government are not more desirous of 
pushing their settlements rather to the north, than the south of 
Port Jackson. The soil and climate would probably improve, 
in the latitude nearer the equator ; and settlements in that po- 
sition would be more contiguous to our Indian colonies. 



by Captain Vancouver, situate in the latitude of 35S Q3> south 
and longitude 118° 12' east ; and it is to be hoped, that a few 
years will disclose many others upon the coast, as well as the 
confirmation or futility of the conjecture, that a still larger 
than Bass Strait dismembers New Holland.'— (pp. 192. 193.) 

We learn from a note subjoined to this passage, 
that, in order to verify or refute this conjecture, of the 
existence of other important inlets on the west coast 
of New Holland, Captain Flinders has sailed with two 
ships under his command, and is said to be accompa- 
nied by several professional men of considerable abi- 
lity. 

Such are the most important contents of Mr. Col- 
lins's book, the style of which we very much approve, 
because it appears to be written by himself ; and we 
must repeat again, that nothing can be more injurious 
to the opinion the public will form of the authenticity 
of a book of this kind, than the suspicion that it has 
been tricked out and embellished by other hands. 
Such men, to be sure have existed as Julius Caesar ; 
but, in general, a correct and elegant style is hardly 
attainable by those who have passed their lives in ac- 
tion ; and no one has such a pedantic love of good 
writing, as to prefer mendacious finery to rough and 
ungrammatical truth. The events which Mr. Collins's 
book records, we have read with great interest. There 
is a charm in thus seeing villages, and churches, and 
farms, rising from a wilderness, where civilized man 
has never set his foot since the creation of the world. 
The contrast between fertility and barrenness, popu- 
lation and solitude, activity and indolence, fills the 
mind with the pleasing images of happiness and in- 
crease. Man seems to move in his proper sphere, 
while he is thus dedicating the powers of his mind 
and body to reap those rewards which the bountiful 
author of all things has assigned to his industry. Nei- 
ther is it any common enjoyment to turn for a while 
from the memory of those distractions which have so 
recently agitated the Old World, and to reflect, that 
its very horrors and crimes may have thus prepared a 
long era of opulence and peace for a people yet in- 
volved in the womb of time. 



WITTMAN'S TRAVELS. (Edinburgh Review, 
1803.) 

Travels in Turkey, Asia Minor, and Syria, tyc. and into 
Egypt. By William Wittman, M. D. 1803. London. Phil- 
lips. 

Dr. Wittman was sent abroad with the military 
mission to Turkey, towards the spring of 1799, and re- 
mained attached to it during its residence in the 
neighbourhood of Constantinople, its march through 
the desert, and its short operations in Egypt. The 
military mission, consisting of General Koehler, and 
some officers and privates of the artillery and engi- 
neers, amounting on the whole to seventy, were as- 
sembled at Constantinople, June 1799, Avhich they left 
in the same month of the following year, joined the 
grand vizier at Jaffa in July, and entered Egypt with 
the Turks in April, 1801. After the military opera- 
tions were concluded there, Dr. Wittman returned 
home by Constantinople, Vienna, &c. 

The travels are written in the shape of a journal, 
which begins and concludes with the events which we 
have just mentioned. It is obvious that the route 
described by Dr. Wittman is not new : he could make 
no cursory and superficial observations upon the people 
whom he saw, or the countries through which ho 

Jiassed, with which the public are not already fami- 
iar. If his travels were to possess any merit at all, 
they were to derive that merit from accurate physical 
researches, from copious information on the state of 
medicine, surgery, and disease in Turkey; and above 
all, perhaps, from gratifying the national curiosity 
which all inquiring minds must feel upon the nature of 
the plague, and the indications of cure. Dr. Wittman, 
too, was passing over the same ground trodden by 
Bonaparte in his Syrian expedition, and had an ample 
opportunity of inquiring its probable object, a*»d the 
probable success which (but for the heroic defence of 
Acre) , might have attended it ; he was on the theatre 



WITTMAN'S TRAVELS. 



249 



of Bonaparte's imputed crimes, as well as his noto- 
rious defeat ; and might have brought us back, not 
anile conjecture, but sound evidence of events which 
must determine his character, who may determine 
our late. We should have been happy also to have 
found in the travels of Dr. Wittman a full account of 
the tactics and manoeuvres of the Turkish army ; and 
this it would not have been difficult to have obtained 
through the medium of his military companions. 
Such appear to us to be the subjects, from an able 
discussion of which, Dr. Wittman might have derived 
considerable reputation, by gratifying the ardour of 
temporary curiosity, and adding to the stock of per- 
manent knowledge. 

Upon opening Dr. Whitman's book, we turned with 
a considerable degree of interest, to the subject of 
Jaffa ; and to do justice to the doctor, we shall quote 
all that he has said upon the subject of Bonaparte's 
conduct at this place. 



' After a breach had been effected, the French troops storm- 
ed and carried the place. It was probably owing to the obsti- 
nate defence made by the Turks, that the French commander- 
in-chief was induced to give orders for the horrid massacre 
which succeeded. Four thousand of the wretched inhabitants 
who had surrendered, and who had in vain implored the mercy 
of their conquerors, were, together with a part of the late 
Turkish garrison of El-Arish, (amounting, it has been said, to 
five or six hundred,) dragged out in cold b\ood, four days after 
the French had obtained possession of Java, to the sand hills, 
about a league distant, in the way to Gaza, and there most in- 
humanly put to death. I have seen the skeletons of these un- 
fortunate victims, which lie scattered over the hills ; a modern 
Golgotha, which remains a lasting disgrace to a nation calling 
itself civilized. It would give pleasure to the author of this 
work, as well as to every liberal mind, to hear these facts con- 
tradicted on substantial evidence. Indeed, I am sorry to add, 
that the charge of cruelty against the French general does not 
rest here. It having been reported, that, previously to the re- 
treat of the French army from Syria, their commander-in- 
chief had ordered all the French sick at Jaffa to be poisoned, 
I was led to make the inquiry to which every one who should 
have visited the spot would naturally have been directed, re- 
specting an act of such singular, and, it should seem, wanton 
inhumanity. It concerns me to have to state, not only that 
such a circumstance was positively asserted to have happened, 
but that, while in Egypt, an individual was pointed out to us, 
as having been the executioner of these diabolical commands.' 
-(p. 128.) 

Now, in this passage, Dr. Wittman offers no other 
evidence whatever of the massacre, than that he had 
seen the skeletons scattered over the hills, and that 
the fact was universally believed. But how does Dr. 
Wittman know what skeletons those were which he 
saw? An oriental camp, affected by the plague, 
leaves as many skeletons behind it as a massacre. 
And though the Turks bury their dead, the doctor 
complains of the very little depth at which they are 
interred ; so that jackals, high winds and a sandy 
soil, might, with great facility, undo the work of 
Turkish sextons. Let any one read Dr. Wittman's 
account of the camp near Jaffa, where the Turks re- 
mained so long in company with the military mission, 
and he will immediately perceive that, a year after 
their departure, it might have been mistaken, with 
great ease for the scene of a massacre. The spot 
which Dr. Wittman saw might have been the spot 
where a battle had been fought. In the turbulent 
state of Syria, and amidst the variety of its barbarous 
inhabitants, can it be imagined that every bloody 
battle, with its precise limits and circumspection, is 
accurately committed to tradition, and faithfully re- 
ported to inquirers ? Besides, why scattered among 
hills ? If 5000 men were marched out to a convenient 
spot and massacred, their remains would be heaped 
up in a small space, a mountain of the murdered, a 
vast bridge of bones and rottenness. As the doctor 
has described the bone scenery, it has much more the 
appearance of a battle and pursuit than of a massacre. 
After all, this gentleman lay eight months under the 
walls of Jaffa ; whence comes it he has given us no 
better evidence ? Were 5000 men murdered in cold 
blood by a division of the French army, a year before, 
and did no man remain in Jaffa, who said, I saw it 
done— I was present when they were m vrched out — 
I went the next day, and saw the seareelj lead bodies 



of the victims ? If Dr. Urtttman received any such 
evidence, why did he not bring it forward? If he never 
inquired for such evidence, how is he qualified to 
write upon the subject ? If he inquired for it and 
could not find it, how is the fact credible ? 

This author cannot make the same excuse as Sir 
Robert Wilson, for the suppression of his evidence, as 
there could be no probability that Bonaparte would 
wreak his vengeance upon Soliman, Aga, Mustapha 
Cawn, Sidi Mahomet, or any given Turks, upon whose 
positive evidence Dr. Wittman might have rested his 
accusation. Two such wicked acts as the poisoning 
and the massacre, have not been committed within 
the memory of man ; — within the same memory, no 
such extraordinary person has appeared, as he who is 
said to have committed them ; and yet, though their 
commission must have been public, no one has yet 
said, Vidi ego. The accusation still rests upon hear- 



At the same time, widely disseminated as this ac- 
cusation has been over Europe, it is extraordinary that 
it has not been contradicted in print : and, though Sir 
Robert Wilson's book must have been read in France, 
that no officer of the division of Bon has come forv/ard 
in vindication of a criminal who could repay incredu- 
lity so well. General Andreossi, who was with the 
First Consul in Syria, treats the accusations as con- 
temptible falsehoods. But though we are convinced 
he is a man of character, his evidence has certainly 
less weight, as he may have been speaking in the mask 
of diplomacy. As to the general circulation of the re- 
port, he must think much higher of the sagacity of 
multitudes than we do, who would convert this into a 
reason of belief. Whoever thinks it so easy to get at 
truth in the midst of passion, should read the various 
histories of the recent rebellion in Ireland ; or he may, 
if he chooses, believe, with thousands of worthy 
Frenchmen, that the infernale was planned by Mr. 
Pitt and Lord Melville. As for us, we will state what 
appears to us to be the truth, should it even chance 
to justify a man in whose lifetime Europe can know 
neither happiness nor peace. 

The story of the poisoning is given by Dr. Wittman 
precisely in the same desultory manner as that of the 
massacre. < An individual was pointed out to us as 
the executioner of these diabolical commands.' By 
how many persons was he pointed out as the execu- 
tioner ? by persons of what authority ? and of what 
credulity ? Was it asserted from personal knowledge, 
or merely from rumour ? Whence comes it that such 
an agent, after the flight of his employer, was not 
driven away by the general indignation of the army ? 
If Dr. Wittman had combined this species of informa- 
tion with his stories, his conduct would have been 
more just, and his accusations would have carried 
greater weight. At present, when he, who had the 
opportunity of telling us so much, has told us so little, 
we are rather less inclined to believe than we were 
before. We do not say these accusations are not 
true, but that Dr. Wittman has not proved them to 
be true. 

Dr. Wittman did not see more than two cases of 
plague : he has given both of them at full length. 
The symptoms were, thirst, headache, vertigo, pains 
in the limbs, bilious vomitings, and painful tumours in 
the groins. The means of cure adopted were, to eva- 
cuate the primae via} ; to give diluting and refreshing 
drinks ; to expel the redundant bile by emetics ; and 
to assuage the pain in the groin by fomentations and 
anodynes ; both cases proved fatal. In one of the 
cases, the friction with warm oil was tried in vain ; 
but it was thought useful in the prevention of plague : 
the immediate effect produced was, to throw the per- 
son rubbed into a very copious perspiration. A patient 
in typhus, who was given over, recovered after this 
discipline was administered. 

The boldness and enterprise of medical men are 
quite as striking as the courage displayed in battle, 
and evince how much the power of encountering dan- 
ger depends upon habit. Many a military veteran 
would tremble to feed upon pas ; to sleep in sheets 
running with water ; or to draw up the breath of fever- 
ish patients. Dr. White might not, perhaps, have 



S50 



WORKS OF THE REV. SIDNEY SMITH. 



marched up to a battery with great alacrity ; but Dr. 
White, in the year 1801, inoculated himself in the 
arms, with recent matter taken from the bubo of a pes- 
tiferous patient, and rubbed the same matter upon dif- 
ferent parts of his body. With somewhat less of cou- 
rage, and more of injustice, he wrapt his Arab servant 
in the bed of a person just dead of the plague. The 
doctor died: and the doctor's man (perhaps to prove 
his master's theory, that the plague was not conta- 
gious), ran away The bravery of our naval officers 
never produced anything superior to this therapeutic 
heroism of the doctor's ; . i ," ,, . xr- tn 

Dr. Wittman has a chapter which he calls An Histo- 
rical Journal of the Plague; but the information 
which it contains amounts to nothing at all. He con- 
fesses that he has had no experience in the complaint ; 
that he has no remedy to offer for its care, and no 
theory for its cause.* The treatment of the minor 
plague of Egypt, ophthalmia, was precisely the method 
common in this country ; and was generally attended 
with success, where the remedies were applied in 

Nothing can be conceived more dreadful than was 
the situation of the military mission in the Turkish 
camp ; exposed to a mutinous Turkish soldiery, to in- 
fection, famine, and a scene of the most abominable 
filth and putrefaction ; and this they endured for a 
year and a half , with the patience of apostles of peace, 
rather than war. Their occupation was to teach dis- 
eased barbarians, who despised them, and thought it 
no small favour that they should be permitted to exist 
in their neighbourhood. They had to witness the cru- 
elties of despotism, and the passions of armed and ig- 
norant multitudes ; and all this embellished with the 
fair probability of being swept off, in some grand en- 
gagement, by the superior tactics and activity of the 
enemy to whom the Turks were opposed. To the 
filth, irregularity, and tumult of a Turkish camp, as it 
appeared to the British officers in 1800, it is curious to 
oppose the picture of one drawn by Busbequius in the 
rrKldle of the sixteenth century: Turcae in proximis 
campis tendebant ; cum vero in eo loco tribus mensi- 
bus vixerhmfuit mihi facultas videndorum ipsorum 
castrorum, et cognoscendae aliqua ex parte disciplines; 
qua de re nisi pauca attingam, habeas tortasse quod 
me accuses. Sumpto habitu Christians hommibus in 
illis locis usitato, cum uno aut altero comite quacun- 
que vagabar ignotus : primum videbam summc- ordme 
cuiusque corporis milites suis locis distributes, et, 
quod vix credat, qui nostratis militiae consuetudrnum 
novit, summum erat ubique silentiurn, summa quies, 
rixa nulla, nullum cujusquam insolens factum ; sea. ne 
nox quidem aut vitulatio per lasciviam aut ebrietatem 
emissa. Ad hac summa mundities, nulla sterquihnui, 
nulla purgamenta, nihil quod oculos aut nares offende- 
ret. Quicquid est hujusmodi, aut defodiunt Turcae, 
aut procul a conspectu submovent. Sed nee ullas 
compotationes aut convivia, nullum aleae genus, mag- 
num nostratis militiae flagitium, videre erat : nulJa 
lusoriarum chartarum, neque tesserarum darnna norurrt 
Turcse.'-^wgeri Busbequu, Epist.Z.y. 187. Hano- 
via. 1622. There is at present, in the Turkish ar- 
my, a curious mixture of the severest despotism in the 
commander, and the most rebellious msolence m the 
soldier. When the soldier misbehaves, the vizier 
cuts his head off, and places it under his arm When 
the soldier is dissatisfied with the vizier, he fires his 
ball through his tent, and admonishes him, by these 
messengers, to a more pleasant exercise of his au- 
thority. That such severe punishments should not 
confer a more powerful authority, and give birth to a 
better discipline, is less extraordinary, if we reflect, 
that we hear only that the punishments are severe, 
not that they are steady, ana that they are mst; for, 
if the Turkish soldiers were always punished with the 
same severity when they were in fault, and never but 
then, it is not in human nature to suppose,, that the 
Turkisn army would long remain in as contemptible a 
state as it now is. But the government soon learn to 

"""T^ne fact mentioned by Dr. Wittman, »PP«»» to be cu- 
rious ;-that Constantinople was nearly free £? m PM ue ' 
during the interruption of its communication with Egypt. 



distinguish between systematic energy, and the ex* 
cesses of casual and capricious cruelty ; the one awes 
them into submission, the other rouses them to re- 
venge. 

Dr. Wittman, in his chapter on the Turkish army, 
attributes much of its degradation to the altered state 
of the corps of Janissaries ; the original constitution 
of which corps was certainly both curious and wise. 
The children of Christians made prisoners in the pre- 
datory incursions of the Turks, or procured in any 
other manner, were exposed in the public markets of 
Constantinople. Any farmer or artificer was at liber- 
ty to take one into his service, contracting with gov- 
ernment to produce him again when he should be want- 
ed : and in the mean time to feed and clothe him, and 
to educate him to such works of labour as are calcu- 
lated to strengthen the body. As the Janissaries 
were killed off, the government drew upon this stock 
of hardy orphans for its levies ; who, instead of hang- 
ing upon weeping parents at their departure, came 
eagerly to the camp, as the situation which they had 
always been taught to look upon as the theatre of 
their future glory, and towards which all their pas- 
sions and affections had been bent, from their earliest 
years. Arrived at the camp, they received at first 
low pay, and performed menial offices for the little di- 
vision of Janissaries to which they were attached : 
' Ad Gianizaros rescriptus primo meret menstruo sti- 
pendio. paulo plus minus, unius ducati cum dimidio. 
Id enim militi novitio, et rudi satis esse censent. Sed, 
tamen ne quid victusnecessitati desit, cum ea decuria. 
in cujus contuernium adscitus est, gratis cibum capit, 
ea conditione, ut in culina reliqoque mmisteno ei de- 
curise serviat; usum armorum adeptus tyro, cnedum 
tamen suis contubernalibus honore neque stipendio par 
unam in sola virtute, se illis aequandi, spem habet : 
utpote si militiae quae prima se obtulerit,tale specimen 
%m dederit, ut dignus judicetur, quityrocinio exemptus, 
honoris gradu et stipendii magnitudine, reliqms Giam- 
zaris par habeatur. Qua quidem spe plenque tyrones 
impulsi, multa praeclare audent, et fortitudme cum ve- 
teranis certant.— Busbequius, De Re Mil. cont. Turc. 
Instit. Consilium* The same author observes, that 
there was no rank or dignity in the Turkish army, to 
which a common Janissary might not arrive, by his 
courage or his capacity. This last is a most powerful 
motive to exertion, and is, perhaps, one leading cau&e 
of the superiority of the French arms. Ancient gov- 
ernments promote, from numberless causes, which 
ought to have no concern with promotion : revolution- 
ary governments, and military despotisms, can make 
generals of persons fit to be generals : to enable them 
to be unjust in all other instances, they are forced to 
be just in this. What, in fact, are the sultans and pa- 
chas of Paris, but Janissaries raised from the ranks < 
At present, the Janissaries are procured from the low- 
est of the people, and the spirit of the corps is evapo- 
rated. The low state of their armies is in some de- 
gree imputable to this ; but the principal reason why 
the Turks are no longer as powerful as they were is, 
that they are no longer enthusiasts, and that the war 
is now become more a business of science than of per- 
sonal courage. . . . _. ' ., 
The person of the greatest abilities in the lurkish 
empire is the capitan pacha ; he has disciplined some 
ships and regiments in the European fashion, and 
would, if he were well seconded, bring about some im- 
portant reforms in the Turkish empire. But what is 
become of all the reforms of the famous Gazi Hassan ? 
The blaze of partial talents is soon extmguifhed. 
Never was there so great a prospect of improvement 
as that afforded by the exertions of this celebrated 
man, who, in spite of the ridicule thrown upon him by 
Baron de Tott, was such a man as the Turks cannot 
expect to see again once in a century He had the 
whole power of the Turkish empire at his diposal for 
fifteen years; and, after repeated efforts to improve 



* This is a verv spirited appeal to his countrymen on the 
trem^ndous a powe y r oTfheTulks ; and, with the substitution 
Sf France for Turkey, is so applicable to the present tunes, 
that it might be spoken in Parliament with great effect. 



CATHOLIC CLAIMS. 



351 



the army, abandoned the scheme as totally impracti- 
cable. The celebrated Bonneval, in his time, and De 
Tott since, made the same attempt with the same suc- 
cess. They are not to be taught ; and six months after 
his death, every thing the present capitan pacha has 
done will be immediately pulled to pieces. The pre- 
sent grand vizier is a man of no ability. There are 
some very entertaining instances of his gross igno- 
rance cited in the 133d page of the Travels. Upon the 
news being communicated to him that the earth was 
round, he observed that this could not be the case ; 
for the people and the objects on the other side would 
in that case fall off; and that the earth could not 



move round the sun : for if so a ship bound from Jaffa 
to Constantinople ? instead of proceeding to the capit- 
al, would be carried to London, or elsewhere. We 
cannot end this article without confessing with great 
pleasure the entertainment we have received from the 
work which occasions it. It is an excellent lounging- 
book, full of pleasant details, never wearing by pro- 
lixity, or offending by presumption, and is apparently 
the production of a respectable worthy man. So far 
we can conscientiously recommend it to the public ; 
for any thing else, 

Non cuivis homini contingit adire, &c. &c. &c. 



SPEECHES, LETTERS, ETC. 



CATHOLIC CLAIMS. 

A Speech at a Meeting of the Clergy of the Archdeacon- 
ry of the East Riding of Yorkshire, held at Beverley, 
in that Riding, on Monday, April 11, 1825, for the 
Purpose of Petitioning Parliament, fyc* 

Mr. Archdeacon, — It is very disagreeable to me 
to differ from so many worthy and respectable clergy- 
men here assembled, and not only to differ from them, 
but, I am afraid, to stand alone among them. I would 
much rather vote in majorities, and join in this, or any 
other political chorus, than to stand unassisted and 
alone, as I am now doing. I dislike such meetings for 
such purposes — I wish I could reconcile it to my con- 
science to stay away from them, and to my tempera- 
ment to be silent at them ; but if they are called by 
others, I deem it right to attend — if I attend I must 
say what I think. If it is unwise in us to meet in ta- 
verns to discuss political subjects, the fault is not 
mine, for I should never think of calling such a meet- 
ing. If the subject is trite, no blame is imputable to 
me : it is as dull to me to handle such subjects, as it is 
to you to hear them. The customary promise on the 
threshold of an inn is good entertainment for man 
and horse. — If there is any truth in any part of this 
sentence at the Tiger, at Beverley, our horses at this 
moment must certainly be in a state of much greater 
enjoyment than the masters who rode them. 

It will be some amusement, however, to this meet- 
ing, to observe the schism which this question has oc- 
casioned in my own parish of Londesborough. My 
excellent and respectable curate, Mr. Milestones, 
alarmed at the effect of the pope upon the East Rid- 
ing, has come here to oppose me, and there he stands, 
breathing war and vengeance on the Vatican. We had 
some previous conversation on this subject, and, in im- 
itation of our superiors, we agreed not to make it a 
cabinet question. — Mr. Milestones, indeed, with that 
delicacy and propriety which belong to his character, 
expressed some scruples upon the propriety.of voting 
against his rector, but I insisted he should, come and 
vote against me. I assured him nothing would give 
me more pain than to think I had prevented in any 
man, the free assertion of honest opinions. That such 
conduct, on his part, instead of causing jealousy and 

* I was left at this meeting in a minority of one. A poor 
clergyman whispered to me, tnt he was quite of my way 
of thinking, but had nine children. I begged he would remain 
• Protestant. 



animosity between us, could not, and would not fail to 
increase my regard and respect for him. 

I beg leave, sir, before I proceed on this subject, to 
state what I mean by Catholic emancipation. I mean 
eligibility of Catholics to all civil offices, with the usu- 
al exceptions introduced into all bills — jealous safe- 
guards for the preservation of the Protestant church, 
and for the regulation of the intercourse with Rome— 
and, lastly, provision for the Catholic clergy. 

I object, sir, to the law as it stands at present, be 
cause it is impolitic, and because it is unjust. It is 
impolitic, because it exposes this country to the great- 
est danger in time of war. Can you believe, sir, can 
any man of the most ordinary turn for observation, be* 
lieve, that the monarchs of Europe mean to leave this 
country in the quiet possession of the high station 
which it at present holds ? Is it not obvious that a war 
is coming on between the governments of law and the 
governments of despotism ? — that the weak and totter 
ing race of the Bourbons will (whatever our wishes 
may be) be compelled to gratify the wounded vanity 
of the French, by plunging them into a war with Eng- 
land. Already they are pitying the Irish people, as 
you pity the West Indian slaves — already they are 
opening colleges for the reception of Irish priests ? — 
Will they wait for your tardy wisdom and reluctant 
liberality? Is not the present state of Ireland a pre- 
mium upon early invasion ? Does it not hold out the 
most alluring invitation to your enemies to begin ? And 
if the flag of any hostile power in Europe is unfurled in 
that unhappy country, is there one Irish peasant who 
will not hasten to join it ? — and not only the peasantry, 
sir; the peasantry begin these things, but the peasantry 
do not end them — they are soon joined by an order a 
little above them— and. then, after a trifling success, a 
still superior class think it worth while to try the risk: 
men are hurried into a rebellion, as the oxen were 
pulled into the cave of Cacus — tail foremost. The 
mob first, who have nothing to lose but their lives, of 
which every Irishman has nine — then comes the shop- 
keeper — then the parish priest — then the vicar-general 
— then Dr. Doyle, and, lastly, Daniel O'Connell. But 
if the French were to make the same blunders respect- 
ing Ireland as Napoleon committed, if wind and wea- 
ther preserved Ireland for you a second time, still all 
your resources would be crippled by watching Ire- 
land. The force employed for this might liberate Spain 
and Portugal, protect India, or accomplish any great 
purpose of offence or defence. 

War, sir, seems to be almost as natural a state to 
mankind as peace ; but if you could hope to escape 



252 



WORKS OF THE REV. SIDNEY SMITH. 



war, is there a more powerful receipt for destroying 
the prosperity of any country, than these eternal 
jealousies and distinctions between the two religions ? 
What man will carry his industry and his capital into 
a country where his yard measure is a sword, his 
pounce-box a powder-flask, and his ledger a return of 
Killed and wounded ? Where a cat will get, there I 
know a cotton-spinner will penetrate ; but let these gen- 
tlemen wait till a few of their factories have been burned 
down, till one or two respectable merchants of Man 
Chester have been carded and till they have seen the 
cravatists hanging the shanavists in cotton twist. In 
the present fervour for spinning, ourang-ou tangs, sir, 
would be employed to spin, if they could be found in 
sufficient quantities ; but miserably will those reason- 
ers be disappointed who repose upon cotton — not upon 
justice — and who imagine this great question can be 
put aside, because a few hundred Irish spinners are 
gaining a morsel of bread by the overflowing industry 
of the English market. 

But what right have you to continue these rules, sir, 
these laws of exclusion ? What necessity can you 
show for it ? Is the reigning monarch a concealed 
Catholic ? — Is his successor an open one ? — Is there a 
disputed succession ? — Is there a Catholic pretender ? 
If some of these circumstances are said to have justi- 
fied the introduction, and others the continuation of 
these measures, why does not the disappearance of all 
these circumstances justify the repeal of the restric- 
tions ? If you must be unjust — if it is a luxury you 
cannot five without — reserve your injustice for the 
weak, and not for the strong — persecute the Unitari- 
ans, muzzle the Ranters, be unjust to a few thousand 
sectaries, not to six millions — galvanize a frog, don't 
galvanize a tiger. 

If you go into a parsonage-house in the country, Mr. 
Archdeacon, you see sometimes a style and fashion of 
furniture which does very well for us, but which has 
had its day in London. It is seen in London no more ; 
it is banished to the provinces ; from the gentlemen's 
houses of the provinces these pieces of furniture, as 
soon as they are discovered to be unfashionable, des- 
cend to the farm-houses, then to cottages, then to the 
faggot-heap, then to the dung-hill. As it is with fur- 
niture , so is it with arguments. I hear at country 
meetings many arguments against the Catholics which 
are never heard in London ; their London existence is 
over — they are only to be met with in the provinces, 
and there they are fast hastening down, with clumsy 
chairs and ill- fashioned sofas, to another order of men. 
But, sir, as they are not yet gone where I am sure they 
are going, I shall endeavour to point out their defects, 
and to accelerate their descent. 

Many gentlemen now assembled at the Tiger Inn, 
at Beverley, believe that the Catholics do not keep 
faith with heretics ; these gentlemen ought to know 
that Mr. Pitt put this very question to six of the lead- 
ing Catholic universities in Europe. He inquired of 
them whether this tenet did or did not constitute any 
part of the Catholic faith. The question received from 
these universities the most decided negative ; they de- 
nied that such doctrine formed any part of the creed 
of Catholics. Such doctrine, sir, is denied upon oath, 
in the bill now pending in Parliament, a copy of which 
I hold in my hand. The denial of such a doctrine upon 
oath is the only means by which a Catholic can relieve 
himself from his present incapacities. If a Catholic, 
therefore sir, refuses to take the oath, he is not re- 
lieved, and remains where you wish him to remain ; if 
he does take the oath, you are safe from this peril ; if 
he has no scruple about oaths, of what consequence is 
it whether this bill passes, the very object of which is 
to relieve him from oaths ? Look at the fact, sir. Do 
the Protestant cantons of Switzerland, living under the 
same state with the Catholic cantons, complain that 
no faith is kept with heretics ? Do not the Catholics 
and Protestants in the kingdom of the Netherlands 
meet in one common Parliament ? Could they pursue 
a common purpose, have common friends, and com- 
mon enemies, if there was a shadow of truth in this 
doctrine imputed to the Catholics ? The religious af- 
fairs of this last kingdom are managed with the strict- 
est impartiality to both sects ? ten Catholics and ten 



Protestants (gentlemen need not look so much surpris 
ed to hear it,) positively meet together, sir, in the 
same room. They constitute what is called the reli- 
gious committee for the kingdom of the Netherlands, 
and so extremely desirous are they of preserving the 
strictest impartiality, that they have chosen a Jew for 
their secretary. Their conduct has been unimpeacha- 
ble and unimpeached ; the two sects are at peace with 
each other ; and the doctrine, that no faith is kept with 
heretics, would, I assure you, be very little credited at 
Amsterdam or the Hague, cities as essentially Protes- 
tant as the town of Beverley. 

Wretched is our condition, and still more wretched 
the condition of Ireland, if the Catholic does not res- 
pect his oath. He serves on grand and petty juries in 
both countries ; we trust our lives, our liberties, and 
our properties, to his conscientious reverence of an 
oath, and yet, when it suits the purposes of party to 
bring forth this argument, we say he has no respect for 
oaths. The right to a landed estate of 3000Z. per an- 
num was decided last week, in York, by a jury, the 
foreman of which was a Catholic ; does any human be- 
ing harbour a thought, that this gentleman, whom we 
all know and respect, would, under any circumstances, 
have thought more lightly of the obligation of an oath, 
than his Protestant brethren of the box ? We all dis- 
believe these arguments of Mr. A. the Catholic, and 
of Mr. B. the Catholic ; but we believe them of Catho- 
ics in general, of the abstract Catholics, of the Catho- 
lic of the Tiger Inn, at Beverley, the formidable un- 
known Catholic, that is so apt to haunt our clerica] 
meetings. 

I observe that some gentlemen who argue this ques- 
tion, are very bold about other offices, but very jealous 
lest Catholic gentlemen should become justices of the 
peace. If this jealousy is justifiable anywhere, it is 
justifiable in Ireland, where some of the best and most 
respectable magistrates are Catholics. 

It is not true that the Roman Catholic religion is 
what it was. I meet that assertion with a plump de- 
nial. The pope does not dethrone kings, nor give 
away kingdoms, does not extort money, has given up, 
in some instances, the nomination of bishops to Cath 
olic princes, in some, I believe, to Protestant princes; 
Protestant worship is now carried on at Rome. In 
the Low Countries, the seat of the Duke of Alva's 
cruelties, the Catholic tolerates the Protestant, and 
sits with him in the same Parliament — the same in 
Hungary — the same in France. The first use which 
even the Spanish people made of their ephemeral lib- 
erty, was to destroy the Inquisition. It was destroyed 
also by the mob at Portugal. I am so far from think- 
ing the Catholic not to be more tolerant than he 
was, that I am much afraid the English, who gave the 
first lesson of toleration to mankind, will very soon 
have a great deal to learn from their pupils. 

Some men quarrel with the Catholics, because their 
language was violent in the Association ; but a groan 
or two, sir, after two hundred years of incessant tyran- 
ny, may surely be forgiven. A few warm phrases to 
compensate the legal massacre of a million of Irish- 
men are not unworthy of our pardon. All this hardly 
deserves the eternal incapacity of holding civil offices. 
Then they quarrel with the Bible Society ; in other 
words, they vindicate that ancient tenet of their church, 
that the Scriptures are not to be left to the unguided 
judgment of the laity. The objection to Catholics is, 
that they did what Catholics ought to do — and do not 
many prelates of our church object to the Bible Socie- 
ty, and contend that the Scriptures ought not to be cir- 
culated without the comment of the Prayer Book and 
the Articles ? If they arc right, the Catholics are not 
wrong; and if the Catholics are wrong, they are in 
such good company, that we ought to respect their 
errors. 

Why not pay their clergy? the Presbyterian clergy 
in the north of Ireland are paid by the state ; the 
Catholic clergy of Canada are provided for : the priests 
of the Hindoos are, I believe, in some of their temples, 
paid by the Company. You must surely admit, that i 
the Catholic religion (the religion of two-thirds of Eu- 
rope,^ is better than no religion. I do not regret that 
the Irish are under the dominion of the. priests. I am I 



CATHOLIC CLAIMS. 



glad that so savage a people as the lower orders of 
Irish are under the dominion of their priests ; for it is 
a step gained to place such beings under any influence, 
and the clergy are always the first civilize rs of man- 
kind. The Irish are deserted by their natural aristo- 
cracy, and I should wish to make their priesthood res- 
pectable in their appearance, and easy in their circum- 
stances. A government provision has produced the 
most important changes in the opinions of the Presby- 
terian clergy of the north of Ireland, and has changed 
them from levellers and Jacobins into reasonable men ; 
it would not fail to improve most materially the politi- 
cal opinions of the Catholic priests. This cannot, 
however, be done, without the emancipation of the 
laity. No priest would dare to accept a salary from 
government, unless this preliminary was settled. I am 
aware it would give to government a tremendous pow- 
er in that country ; but I must choose the least of two 
evils. The great point, as the physicians say, in some 
diseases, is to resist the tendency to death. The great 
object of our day is to prevent the loss of Ireland, and 
the consequent ruin of England ; to obviate the ten- 
dency to death ; we will first keep the patient alive, 
and then dispute about his diet and his medicine. 

Suppose a law were passed, that no clergyman, who 
had ever held a living in the East Riding, could be 
made a bishop. Many gentlemen here (who have no 
hopes of ever being removed from their parishes) would 
febl the restriction of the law as a considerable degra- 
dation. We should soon be pointed at as a lower or- 
der of clergymen. It would not be long before the 
common people would find some fortunate epithet for 
us, and it would not be long either before we should 
observe in our brethren of the north and west an air of 
superiority, which would aggravate not a little the jus- 
tice of the privation. Every man feels the insults 
thrown upon his caste ; the insulted party falls lower, 
every body else becomes higher. There are heart- 
burnings and recollections. Peace flies from that land. 
The volume of parliamentary evidence I have brought 
here is loaded with the testimony of witnesses of all 
ranks and occupations, stating to the House of Com- 
mons the undoubted effects produced upon the lower 
order of Catholics by these disqualifying laws, and the 
lively interest they take in their removal. I have sev- 
enteen quotations, sir, from this evidence, and am rea- 
dy to give any gentleman my references ; but I for- 
bear to read them, from compassion to my reverend 
brethren, who have trotted many miles to vote against 
the pope, and who will trot back in the dark, if I at- 
tempt to throw additional light upon the subject. 

I have, also, sir, a high-spirited class of gentlemen 
to deal with, who will do nothing from fear, who ad- 
mit the danger, but think it disgraceful to act as if 
they feared it. There is a degree of fear, which de- 
stroys a man's faculties, renders him incapable of act- 
ing, and makes him ridiculous. There is another sort 
of fear, which enables a man to foresee a coming evil, 
to measure it, to examine his powers of resistance, to 
balance the evil of submission against the evils of op- 
position or defeat, and if he thinks he must be ulti- 
mately overpowered, leads him to find a good escape 
in a good time. I can see no possible disgrace in this 
sort of fear, and in listening to its suggestions. But it 
is mere cant to say, that men will not be actuated by 
fear in such questions as these. Those who pretend 
not to fear now, would be the first to fear upon the 
approach of danger ; it is always the case with this 
distant valour. Most of the concessions which have 
been given to the Irish have been given to fear. 
Ireland would have been lost to this country, if the 
British legislature had not, with all the rapidity and 
precipitation of the truest panic, passed those acts 
which Ireland did not ask, but demanded in the time 
of her armed associations. I should not think a man 
brave, but mad, who did not fear the treasons and re- 
bellions of Ireland in time of war. I should think 
him not dastardly, but consummately wise, who pro- 
rided against them in time of peace. The Catholic 
question has made a greater progress since the open- 
ing of this Parliament than I ever remember it to 
have made, and it has made that progress from 
fear alone. The House of Commons were astonished 



by the union of the Irish Catholics. They saw that 
Catholic Ireland had discovered her strength, and 
stretched out her limbs, and felt manly powers, and 
called for manly treatment ; and the House of Com- 
mons wisely and practically yielded to the innova- 
tions ot time, and the shifting attitude of human af- 
fairs. 

I admit the church, sir, to be in great danger. I 
am sure the state is so also. My remedy for these 
evils is, to enter into an alliance with the Irish people 
—to conciliate the clergy, by giving them pensions— 
to loyalize the laity, by putting them on a footing 
with the Protestant. My remedy is the old one. ap- 
proved of from the beginning of the world, to lessen 
dangers', by increasing friends, and appeasing ene 
mies. I think it most probable, that under this sys- 
tem of crown patronage, the clergy will be quiet. A 
Catholic layman, who finds all the honours of the 
state open to him, will not, I think, run into treason 
and rebellion— will not live with a rope about his 
neck, in order to turn our bishops out, and put his 
°JV n Irf ma y not ' t00 > be of opinion that the utility 
of his bishop will be four times as great, because his 
income is four times as large ; but whether he is or 
not, he will never endanger his sweet acres (large 
measure) for such questions as these. Anti-trinitari- 
an Dissenters sit in the House of Commons, whom we 
believe to be condemned to the punishments of ano- 
ther world. There is no limit to the introduction of 
Dissenters into both houses— Dissenting Lords or Dis- 
senting Commons. What mischief have Dissenters 
for this last century and a half plotted against the 
Church of England ? The Catholic lord and the Ca- 
tholic gentleman (restored to their fair rights) will 
never join with levellers and Iconoclasts. You will 
find them defending you hereafter against your Pro- 
testant enemies. The crosier in any hand, the mitre 
on any head, are more tolerable in the eyes of a Ca- 
tholic than doxological Barebones and tonsured Crom- 
well. 

We preach to our congregations, sir, that a tree is 
known by its fruits. By the fruits it produces I will 
judge your system. What has it done for Ireland ? 
New Zealand is emerging— Otaheite is emerging- 
Ireland is not emerging— she is still veiled in darkness 
—her children, safe under no law, live in the very sha- 
dow of death. Has your system of exclusion made Ire- 
land rich ? Has is made Ireland loyal ? Has it made 
Ireland free? Has it made Ireland happy ? How is 
the wealth of Ireland proved ? Is it by the naked, idle, 
suffering savages, who are slumbering on the mud floor 
of their cabins ? In what does the loyalty of Ireland 
consist? Is it in the eagerness with which they would 
range themselves under the hostile banner of any inva- 
der, for your destruction and for your distress ? Is it 
liberty when men breathe and move among the bayo- 
nets of English soldiers? Is their happiness and 
their history any thing but such a tissue of murders, 
burnings, hanging, famine, and disease, as never ex- 
isted before in the annals of the world ? This is the 
system which, I am sure, with very different inten- 
tions, and different views of its effects, you are met 
this day to uphold. These are the dreadful conse- 
quences, which those laws your petition prays may 
be continued, have produced upon Ireland. From the 
principles ot that system, from the cruelty of those 
laws, I turn, and turn with the homage of my whole 
heart, to that memorable proclamation which the 
head of our church— the present monarch of these 
realms— has lately made to his hereditary dominions 
of Hanover— That no man should be subjected to civil 
incapacities on account of religious opinions. Sir, there 
have been many memorable things done in this reign. 
Hostile armies have been destroyed ; fleets have been 
captured ; formidable combinations have been broken 
to pieces— but this sentiment, in the mouth of a king, 
deserves more than all glories and victories the notice 
of that historian who is destined to tell to future ages 
the deeds of the English people. I hope he will la- 
vish upon it every gem which glitters in the cabinet of 
genius, and so uphold it to the world that it will be 
remembered when Waterloo is forgotten, and when 
the fall of Paris is blotted out from the memory of 



254 



WORKS OP THE REV. SIDNEY SMITH. 



man. Great as it is, sir, this is not the only pleasure 
I have received in these latter days. I have seen, 
within these few weeks, a degree of wisdom in our 
mercantile law, such superiority to vulgar prejudice, 
views so just and so profound, that it seemed to me as 
if I was reading the works of a speculative economist, 
rather than the improvement of a practical politician, 
agreed to by a legislative assembly, and upon the eve 
of being carried into execution, for the benefit of a 
great people. Let who will be their master, I honour 
and praise the ministers who have learnt such a les- 
son. I rejoice that I have lived to see such an im- 
provement in English affairs — that the stubborn resis- 
tance to all improvement — the contempt of all scienti- 
fic reasoning, and the rigid adhesion to every stupid 
error which so long characterized the proceedings 
of this country, are fast giving way to better things, 
under better men, placed in better circumstances. 

I confess it is not without severe pain that, in the 
midst of all this expansion and improvement, I per- 
ceive that in our profession we are still calling for the 
same exclusion — still asking that the same fetters 
may be riveted on our fellow-creatures — still mistak- 
ing what constitutes the weakness and misfortune of 
the church, for that which contributes to its glory, its 
dignity, and its strength. Sir, there are two petitions 
at this moment in this house, against two of the wis- 
est and best measures which ever came into the Bri- 
tish parliament, against the impending corn law and 
against the Catholic emancipation — the one bill in- 
tended to increase the comforts, and the other to al- 
lay the bad passions of man. — Sir, I am not in a situ- 
ation of life to do much good, but I will take care that 
I will not willingly do any evil. The wealth of the 
riding should not tempt me to petition against either 
of those bills. With the corn bill, I have nothing to 
do at this time. Of the Catholic emancipation bill, I 
shall say, that it will be the foundation stone of a last- 
ing religious peace ; that it will give to Ireland not all 
that it wants, but what it most wants, and without 
which no other boon will be of any avail. 

When this bill passes, it will be a signal to all the 
religious sects of that unhappy country to lay aside 
their mutual hatred, and to live in peace, as equal 
men should live under equal law — when this bill pass- 
es, the Orange flag will fall — when this bill passes. 
the Green flag of the rebel will fall — when this bill 
passes, no other flag will fly in the land of Erin than 
that flag which blends the lion with the harp — that 
flag which, wherever it does fly, is the sign of free- 
dom and of joy — the only banner in Europe which 
floats over a limited king and a free people. 



SPEECH AT THE TAUNTON REFORM 
MEETING* 

Mr. Bailiff, — This is the greatest measure which 
has ever been before Parliament in my time, and the 



* I was a sincere friend to reform ; I am so still. It was a 
great deal too violent — but the only justification is, that you 
cannot reform as you wish, by degrees; you must avail your- 
self of the few opportunities that present themselves. The re- 
form carried, it became the business of every honest man to 
turn it to good, and to see that the people (drunk with their 
new power) did not ruin our ancient institutions. We have 
been in considerable danger, and that danger is not over. 
What alarms me most is the large price paid by both parties 
for popular favour. The yeomanry were put down : nothing 
could be more grossly absurd — the people were rising up 
against the poor laws, and such an excellent and permanent 
force was abolished because they were not deemed a proper 
force to deal with popular insurrections. You may just as 
well object to put out a fire with pond water because pump 
water is better for the purpose : I say, put out the fire with 
the first water yon can get ; but the truth is, radicals don't like 
aimed yeomen: they have an ugly homicide appearance. 
Again,-— a million of revenue is given up in the nonsensical 
penny oost scheme, to please my old, excellent, and universal- 
ly dissentient friend, Noah Warburton. I admire the whig 
ministry, and think they have done more good things than all 
the ministers since the Revolution; but these concessions 
are sad and unworthy marks of weakness, and fill reasonable 
men with just alarm. All this folly has taken place since they 



most pregnant with good or evil to the country; and 
though I seldom meddle with political meetings, I 
could not reconcile it to my conscience to be absent 
from this. 

Every year, for this half century, the question of 
reform has been pressing upon us, till it has swelled 
up at last into this great and awful combination ; so 
that almost every city and every borough in England 
are at this moment assembled lor the same purpose, 
and are doing the same thing we are doing. It damps 
the ostentation of argument and mitigates the pain of 
doubt, to believe (as I believe) that the measure is 
inevitable ; the consequences may be good or bad ; 
but done it must be ; I defy the most determined 
enemy of popular influence, either now or a little time 
from now, to prevent a reform in Parliament. Some 
years ago, by timely concession, it might have been 
prevented. If members had been granted to Birming- 
ham, Leeds and Manchester, and other great towns, as 
opportunities occurred, a spirit of conciliation would 
have been evinced, and the people might have been 
satisfied with a reform, which though remote would 
have been gradual ; but with the customary blindness 
and insolence of human beings, the day of adversity 
was forgotten, the rapid improvement of the people 
was not noticed; the object of a certain class of poli- 
ticians was to please the court and to gratify their own 
arrogance by treating every attempt to expand the 
representation, and to increase the popular influence, 
with every species of contempt and obloquy: the 
golden opportunity was lost ; and now proud lips must 
swallow bitter potions. 

The arguments and practices (as I remember to 
have heard Mr. Huskisson say) , which did very well 
twenty years ago, will not do now. The people read 
too much, think too much, see too many newspapers, 
hear too many speeches, have their eyes too intensely 
fixed upon political events. But if it was possible to 
put off parliamentary reform a week ago, is it possible 
now? When a monarch (whose amiable and popular 
manners have, I verily believe, saved us from a revo- 
luion) approves the measure — when a minister of ex- 
alted character plans and fashions it — when a cabinet 
of such varied talent and disposition protects it — when 
such a body of the aristocracy vote for it — when the 
hundred-horse power of the press is labouring for it ; — 
who does not know, after this, (whatever be the deci- 
sion of the present Parliament), that the measure is 
virtually carried — and that all the struggle between 
such annunciation of such a plan, and its completion, 
is tumult, disorder, disaffection, and (it may be) po- 
litical rum ? 

An honourable member of the honourable house, , 
much comiected with this town, and once its represen- 
tative, seems to be amazingly surprised, and equally 
dissatisfied, at this combination of king, ministers, no 
bles, and people, against his opinion ; — like the gentle- 
man who came home from serving on a jury very much 
disconcerted, and complaining, he had metwith eleven 
of the most obstinate people he had ever seen in his 
fife, whom he found it absolutely impossible by the 
strongest arguments to bring over to his way of thinking. 

They tell you gentlemen that you have grown rich i 
and powerful with these rotten boroughs, and that it t 
would be madness to part with them, or to alter a I 
constitution which had produced such happy effects. 
There happens, gentlemen, to live near my parsonage 
a labouring man, of very superior character and under- 
standing to his fellow labourers ; and who has made 
such good use of that superiority, that he has saved I 
what is (for his station in life) a very considerable 
sum of money, and if his existence is extended to the 
common period, he will die rich. It happens, however, 
that he is (and long has been) troubled with violent' 
stomachic pains, for which he has hitherto obtained I 
no relief, and which really are the bane and torment i 
of his life. Now if my excellent labourer were to send 

have become ministers upon principles of chivalry and gal- 
lantry; and the tories, too, for fear of the people, have been' 
much too quiet. There is only one principle of public conduct | 
Do what you think right, and take place andpower as an acci- 
dent. Upon any other plan, office is shabbiness, labour, and 
sorrow. 



SPEECH AT THE TAUNTON REFORM MEETING. 



266 



for a physician, and to consult him respecting this 
malady, would it not be very singular language if our 
doctor were to say to him, l My good friend, you 
surely will not be so rash as to attempt to get rid of 
these pains in your stomach. Have you not grown 
rich with these pains in your stomach ? have you not 
risen under them from poverty to prosperity ? has not 
your situation, since you were first attacked, been im- 
proving every year ? You surely will not be so foolish 
and so indiscreet as to part with the pains in your sto- 
mach V — Why, what would be the answer of the rus- 
tic to this nonsensical monition ? ' Monster of rhu- 
barb I (he would say) I am not rich in consequence 
of the pains in my stomach, but in spite of the pains 
in my stomach ; and I should have been ten times 
richer, and fifty times happier, if I had never had any 
pains in my stomach at all.' Gentlemen, these rotten 
boroughs are your pains in the stomach — and you 
would have been a much richer and greater people if 
you had never had them at all. Your wealth and your 
power have been owing, not to the debased and cor- 
rupted parts of the House of Commons, but to the ma- 
ny independent and honourable members whom it has 
always contained within its walls. If there had been 
a few more of these very valuable members for close 
boroughs, we should, I verily believe, have been by 
this time about as free as Denmark, Sweden, or the 
Germanized states of Italy. 

They tell you of the few men of name and character 
who have sat for boroughs ; but nothing is said of those 
mean and menial men who are sent down every day 
by their aristocratic masters to continue unjust and 
unnecessary wars, to prevent inquiring into profligate 
expenditure, to take money out of your pockets, or to 
do any other bad or base thing which the minister of 
the day may require at their unclean hands. What 
mischief, it is asked, have these boroughs done ? I 
believe there is not a day of your lives in which you 
are not suffering in all the taxed commodities of life 
from the accumulation of bad votes of bad men. But, 
Mr. Bailiff, if this were otherwise ; if it really were a 
great political invention, that cities of 100,000 men 
should have no representatives, because those repre- 
sentatives were wanted for political ditches, political 
walls, and political parks ; that the people should be 
bought and sold like any other commodity ; that a re- 
tired merchant should be able to go into the market and 
buy ten shares in the government of twenty millions 
of his fellow subjects ; yet can such asseverations be 
made openly before the people ? Wise men, men con- 
versant with human affairs, may whisper such theo- 
ries to each other in retirement ; but can the people 
ever be taught that it is right they should be bought 
and sold? Can the vehemence of eloquent democrats 
be met with such arguments and theories ? Can the 
doubts of honest and limited men be met by such argu- 
ments and theories ? The moment such a government 
is looked at by all the people it is lost. It is impossible 
to explain, defend, and recommend it to the mass of 
mankind. And true enough it is, that as often as mis- 
! fortune threatens us at home, or imitation excites us 

I from abroad, political reform is clamoured for by the 
! people — there it stands, and ever will stand, in the 

apprehension of the multitude — reform, the cure of 
every evil — corruption, the source of every misfortune 
—famine, defeat, decayed trade, depressed agriculture, 
will all lapse into the question of reform. Till that 
question is set at rest (and it may be set at rest), all 
will be disaffection, tumult, and perhaps (which God 
avert]) destruction. 

But democrats and agitators (and democrats and 
agitators there are in the world,) will not be content- 
ed with this reform. Perhaps not, sir ; I never hope 
] to content men whose game is never to be contented — 
| but if they are not contented, I am sure their discon- 
i tent will then comparatively be of little importance. 

I I am afraid of them now ; I have no arguments to an- 
iswer them : but I shall not be afraid of them after this 
fbill, and would tell them boldly in the middle of their 
limobs, that there was no longer cause for agitation and 
I excitement, and that they were intending wickedly to 
|the people. You may depend upon it such a measure 

; would destroy their trade, as the repeal of duties 



would destroy the trade of the smuggler ; their func- 
tions would be carried on faintly, and with little profit ; 
you would soon feel that your position was stable, so- 
lid, and safe. 

All would be well, it is urged, if they would but let 
the people alone. But what chance is there, I demand, 
of these wise politicians, that the people will ever be 
let alone ; that the orator will lay down his craft, and 
the demagogue forget his cunning? If many things 
were let alone, which never will be let alone, the as- 
pect of human affairs would be a little varied. If the 
winds would let the waves alone, there would be no 
storms. If gentlemen would let ladies alone, there 
would he no unhappy marriages, and deserted dam- 
sels. If persons who can reason no better than this, 
would leave speaking alone, the school of eloquence 
might be improved. I have little hopes, however, of 
witnessing any of these acts of forbearance, particu- 
larly the last, and so we must (however foolish it may 
appear), proceed to make laws for a people who, we 
are sure, will not be let alone. 

We might really imagine, from the objections made 
to the plan of reform, that the great mass of English- 
men were madmen, robbers, and murderers. The 
kingly power is to be destroyed, the House of Lords is 
to be annihilated, the church is to be ruined, estates 
are to be confiscated. I am quite at a loss to find in 
these perpetrators of crimes — in this mass of pillagers 
and lunatics — the steady and respectable tradesmen 
and farmers, who will have votes to confer, and the 
steady and respectable country gentlemen, who will 
probably have votes to receive ; — it may be true of 
the tradesmen of Mauritania, it may be just of the 
country gentlemen of Fez — it is any thing but true of 
the English people. The English are a tranquil, 
phlegmatic, money-loving, money-getting people, who 
want to be quiet — and would be quiet if they were not 
surrounded by evils of such magnitude, that it would 
be baseness and pusillanimity not to oppose to them 
the strongest constitutional resistance. 

Then it is said that there is to be a lack of talent in 
the new Parliament : it is to be composed of ordinary 
and inferior persons, who will bring the government of 
the country into contempt. But the best, of all talents, 
gentlemen, is to conduct our affairs honestly, diligent- 
ly, and economically — and this talent will, I am sure, 
abound as much in the new Parliament as in many pre- 
vious parliaments. Parliament is not a school for rhe- 
toric and declamation, where a stranger would go to 
hear a speech, as he would go to the opera to hear a 
song ; but if it were otherwise — if eloquence be a ne- 
cessary ornament of, and an indispensable adjunct to, 
popular assemblies — can it ever be absent from popu- 
lar assemblies ? I have always found that all things 
moral or physical grow in the soil best suited for them. 
Show me a deep and tenacious earth — and I am sure 
the oak will sprmg up in it. In a low and damp soil I 
am equally certain of the alder and the willow. Gen- 
tlemen, the free Parliament of a free people is the na- 
tive soil of eloquence — and in that soil will it ever 
flourish and abound — there it will produce those intel- 
lectual effects which drive before them whole tribes 
and nations of the human race, and settle the destinies 
of man. And, gentlemen, if a few persons of a less el- 
egant and aristocratic description were to become 
members of the House of Commons, where would be 
the evil ? They would probably understand the com- 
mon people a great deal better, and in this way the 
feelings and interests of all classes of people would be 
better represented. The House of Commons, thus or- 
ganized, will express more faithfully the opinions of 
the people. 

The people are sometimes, it is urged, grossly mis- 
taken; but are kings never mistaken? Are the higher 
orders never mistaken ? — never wilfully corrupted by 
their own interests ? The people have at least this su- 
periority, that they always intend to do what is right. 

The argument of fear is very easily disposed of: he 
who is afraid of a knock on the head or a cut on the 
cheek is a coward ; he who is afraid of entailing great- 
er evils on the country by refusing the remedy than by 
applying it, and who acts in pursuance of that convic 
tion, is a wise an'} prudent man — nothing can be more 



WORKS OF THE REV. SIDNEY SMITH. 



different than personal and political fear; it is the 
artifice of our opponents to confound them together. 

The right of disfranchisement, gentlemen, must ex- 
ist somewhere, and where but in Parliament ? If not, 
how was the Scotch union, how was the Irish union, 
effected ? The Duke of Wellington's administration 
disfranchised at one blow 200,000 Irish voters — for no 
fault of theirs, and for no other reason than the best of 
all reasons, that public expediency required it. These 
very same politicians are now looking in an agony of 
terror at the disfranchisement of corporations contain- 
ing twenty or thirty persons, sold to their representa- 
tives, who are themselves perhaps sold to the govern- 
ment : and to put an end to these enormous abuses is 
called corporation robbery, and there are some persons 
wild enough to talk of compensation. This principle 
of compensation you will consider perhaps in the 
following instance to have been carried as far as sound 
discretion permits. When I was a young man, the 
place in England I remember as most notorious for 
highwaymen and their exploits was Finchley Common, 
near the metropolis; but Finchley Common, gentle- 
men, in the progress of improvement, came to be 
enclosed, and the highwaymen lost by these means the 
opportunity of exercising their gallant vocation. I 
remember a friend of mine proposed to draw up for 
them a petition to the House of Commons for compen- 
sation, which ran in this manner — ' We, your loyal 
highwaymen of Finchley Common, and its neighbour- 
hood, having, at great expense, laid in a stock of 
blunderbusses, pistols, and other instruments for 
plundering the public, and finding ourselves impeded 
in the exercise of our calling by the said enclosure of 
the said Common of Finchley, humbly petition your 
honourable house will be pleased to assign to us such 
compensation as your honourable house in its wisdom 
and justice may think fit.' Gentlemen, I must leave 
the application to you. 

An honourable baronet says, if Parliament is dissol- 
ved, I will go to my borough with the bill in my hand, 
and will say, ' I know of no crime you have commit- 
ted, I found nothing proved against you : I voted 
against the bill, and am come to fling myself upon 
your kindness, with the hope that my conduct will be 
approved, and that you will return me again to Parlia- 
ment.' That honourable baronet may, perhaps, re- 
ceive from his borough an answer he little expects — 
' We are above being bribed by such a childish and 
unworthy artifice ; we do not choose to consult our 
own interest at the expense of the general peace and 
happiness of the country ; we are thoroughly convinc- 
ed a reform ought to take place ; we are very willing 
to sacrifice a privilege we ought never to have possess- 
ed to the good of the community, and we will return 
no one to Parliament who is not deeply impressed with 
the same feeling.' This I hope is the answer that 
gentleman will receive, and this, I hope, will be the 
noble and generous feeling of every borough in Eng- 
land. 

The greater part of human improvements, gentle- 
men, I am sorry to say, are made after war, tumult, 
bloodshed, and civil commotion : mankind seem to 
object to every species of gratuitous happiness, and to 
consider every advantage as too cheap, which is not 
purchased by some calamity. I shall esteem it as a 
singular act of God's providence, if this great nation, 
guided by these warnings of history, not waiting till 
tumult for reform, nor trusting reform to the rude 
hands of the lowest of the people, shall amend their 
decayed institutions at a period when they are ruled 
by a popular monarch, guided by an upright minister, 
and blest with profound peace. 



SPEECH AT TAUNTON 

Mb. Chairman, — I am particularly happy to assist 
on this occasion, because I think that the accession of 
the present king is a marked and important era in Eng- 
lish history. Another coronation has taken place 
since I have been in the world, but I never assisted at 
its celebration. I saw in it a change of masters, not a 



change of system. I did not understand the joy which 
it occasioned. I did not feel it, and I did not counter- 
feit what I did not feel. 

I think very differently of the accession of his pre- 
sent majesty. I believe I see in that accession a great 
probability of serious improvement, and a great in- 
crease of public happiness. The evils which have 
been long complained of by bold and intelligent men 
are now universally admitted. The public feeling, 
which has been so long appealed to, is now intensely 
excited. The remedies which have been so often 
called tor are now at last vigorously, wisely, and faith- 
fully applied. I admire, gentlemen, in the present 
king, his love of peace — I admire in him his disposi- 
tion to economy — and I admire in him, above all, his 
faithful and honourable conduct to those who happen 
to be his ministers. He was, I believe, quite as faith- 
ful to the Duke of Wellington as to Lord Grey, and 
would, I have no doubt, be quite as faithful to the 
political enemies of Lord Grey (if he thought fit tc 
employ them) as he is to Lord Grey himself. There 
is, in this reign, no secret influence, no double minis- 
try — on whomsoever he confers the office, to him he 
gives that confidence without which the office cannot 
be holden with honour, nor executed with effect. He 
is not only a peaceful king, and an economical king, 
but he is an honest king. So far, I believe, every 
individual of this company will go with me. There is 
another topic of eulogium, on which, before I sit 
down, I should like to say a few words — I mean the 
willingness of our present king to investigate abuses 
and to reform them. If this subject is not unpleasant, 
I will offer upon it a very few observations — a few, 
because the subject is exhausted, and because, if it 
were not, I have no right, from my standing or my 
situation in this country, to detain you long upon that 
or any other subject. 

In criticising this great question of reform, I think 
there is some injustice done to its authors. Men 
seem to suppose that a minister can sit down and 
make a plan of reform with as much ease and as much 
exactness, and with as complete a gratification of his 
own will, as an architect can do in a building or 
altering a house. But a minister of state (it should be 
in justice observed), works in the hands of hatred, 
injustice, violence, and the worst of human passions — 
his works are not the works of calm and unembarrass- 
ed wisdom — they are not the best that a dreamer of 
dreams can imagine. It is enough if they are the best 
plans which the parties, passions, and prejudices of 
the times in which he acts will permit. In passing a 
reform bill, the minister overthrows the long and deep 
interest which powerful men have in existing abuses 
— he subjects himself to the deepest hatred, and en- 
counters the bitterest opposition. Auxiliaries he must 
have, and auxiliaries he can only find among the peo- 
ple — not the mob — but the great mass of those who 
have opinions worth hearing, and property worth 
defending — a greater mass, I am happy to say, in this 
country than exists in any other country on the face 
of the earth. Now. before the middling orders will 
come forward with one great impulse, they must see 
that something is offered them worth the price of con- 
tention; they must see that the object is great, and 
the gain serious. If you call them in at all, it must i 
not be to displace one faction at the expense of ano- 
ther, but to put down all factions — to substitute purity , 
and principle for corruption — to give to the many that I 
political power which the few have unjustly taken to 
themselves — to get rid of evils so ancient and so vast 
that any other arm than the public arm would be lifted 
up against them in vain. This, then, I say, is one of 
the reasons why ministers have been compelled to 
make their measures a little more vigorous and deci- 
sive than a speculative philosopher, sitting in his clo- 
set, might approve of. They had a mass of opposition 
to contend with, which could be encountered only by a 
general exertion of public spirit— they had a long-suf- 
fering and an often deceived public to appeal to, who 
were determined to suffer no longer, and to be deceived! 
no more. The alternative was to continue the ancient 
abuses, or to do what they have done — and most firmly 
do I believe that you and I, and the latest posterity of 



SPEECH AT TAUNTON. 



267 



us all, will rejoice in the decision they have made. 
Gradation has been called for in reform : we might, it 
is said, have taken thirty or forty years to have accom- 
plished what we have done in one year. ' It is not so 
much the magnitude of what you are doing we object 
to, as the suddenness.' But was not gradation ten- 
dered? Was it not said by the friends of reform — 
1 Give us Birmingham and Manchester, and we will be 
satisfied V and what was the answer ? l No Manches- 
ter, no Birmingham, nojreform in any degree — all abu- 
ses as they are — all perversions as we have found 
them — the corruptions which our fathers bequeathed 
us we will hand down unimpaired and unpurified to our 
children.' But I would say to the graduate philoso- 
sopher, — ' How often does a reforming minister occur ?' 
and if such are so common that you can command 
them when you please, how often does a reforming 
monarch occur ? and how often does the conjunction 
of both occur ? Are you sure that a people, bursting 
into new knowledge, and speculating on every public 
event, will wait for your protracted reform ? Strike 
while the iron is hot — up with the arm and down with 
the hammer, and up again with the arm, and down 
again with the hammer. The iron is hot — the oppor- 
tunity exists now — if you neglect it, it may not return 
for an hundred years to come. 

There is an argument I have often heard, and that is 
this — Are we to be afraid ? — is this measure to be car- 
ried by intimidation ? — is the House of Lords to be 
overawed ? But this style of argument proceeds from 
confounding together two sets of feelings which are 
entirely distinct— personal fear and political fear. If 
I am afraid of voting against this bill, because a mob 
may gather about the House of Lords— because stones 
may be flung at my head — because my house may be 
attacked by a mob, I am a paltroon, and unfit to med- 
dle with public affairs ; but I may rationally be afraid 
of producing great public agitation — I may be honour- 
ably afraid of flinging people into secret clubs and con- 
spiracies — I may be wisely afraid of making the aris- 
tocracy hateful to the great body of the people. This 
surely has no more to do with fear than a loose iden- 
tity of name; it is in fact prudence of the highest 
order ; the deliberate reflection of a wise man who 
does not like what he is going to do, but likes still 
less the consequence of not doing it, and who, of two 
evils, chooses the least. 

There are some men much afaid of what is to hap- 
pen : my lively hope of good is, I confess, mingled 
with very little apprehension : but of one thing I must 
be candid enough to say I am much afraid, and that is 
of the opinion now increasing, that the people are 
becoming indifferent to reform ; and of that opinion I 
am afraid, because I believe in an evil hour it may 
lead some misguided members of the upper house of 
Parliament to vote against the bill. As for the opi- 
nion itself, I hold it in the utmost contempt. The 
people are waiting in virtuous patience for the com- 
pletion of the bill, because they know it is in the hands 
of men who do not mean to deceive them. I do not 
believe they have given up one atom of reform — I do 
not believe that a great people were ever before so 
firmly bent upon any one measure. I put it to any 
man of common sense, whether he believes it possi- 
ble, after the king and Parliament have acted as they 
have done, that the people will ever be contented with 
much less than the present bill contains. If a contra- 
ry principle is acted upon, and the bill attempted to be 
;ot rid of altogether, I confess I tremble for the con- 
equences, which I believe will be of the worst and 
most painful description ; and this I say deliberately, 
ifter the most diligent and extensive inquiry. Upon 
that diligent inquiry I repeat again my firm convic- 
tion, that the desire of reform has increased, not di- 
minished ; that the present repose is not indifference, 
but the calmness of victory, and the tranquillity of 
success. When I see all the wishes and appetites of 
created beings changed, — when I see an eagle, that, 
after long confinement, has escaped into the air, come 
back to his cage and his chain, — when I see the 
emancipated negro asking again for the hoe which has 
broken down his strength, and the lash which has 
toitured bis body, — I will then, and not till then, be- 
ll 



lieve that the English people will return lo theii 
ancient degradation — that they will hold out their 
repentant hands for those manacles which at this mo 
ment lay broken into links at their feet. 



SPEECH AT TAUNTON. 
(From the i Taunton Courier' of October 12th, 1831.) 

The Reverend Sidney Smith rose and said : Mr. 
Bailiff, I have spo-ken so often on this subject, that I 
am sure both you and the gentlemen here present will 
be obliged to me for saying but little, and that favour 
I am as willing to confer, as you can be to receive it. I 
feel most deeply the event which has taken place, be- 
cause, by putting the two houses of Parliament in col- 
lision with each other, it will impede the public busi- 
ness, and diminish the public prosperity. I feel it as 
a churchman, because I cannot but blush to see so 
many dignitaries of the church arrayed against the 
wishes and happiness of the people I feel it more 
than all, because I believe it will sow the seeds of 
deadly hatred between the aristocracy and the great 
mass of the people. The loss of the bill I do not feel, 
and for the best of all possible reasons — because I 
have not the slightest idea that it is lost. I have no 
more doubt, before the expiration of the winter, that 
this bill will pass, than I have that the annual tax bill 
will pass, and greater certainty than this no man can 
have, for Franklin tells us, there are but two things 
certain in this world — death and taxes. As for the 
possibility of the House of Lords preventing ere long 
a reform of Parliament, I hold it to be the most absurd 
notion that ever entered into human imagination. I 
do not mean to be disrespectful, but the attempt of 
the lords to stop the progress of reform, reminds me 
very forcibly of the great storm of Sidmouth, and of 
the conduct of the excellent Mrs. Partington on that 
occasion. In the winter of 1824, there set in a great 
flood upon that town — the tide rose to an incredible 
height — the waves rushed in upon the houses, and eve- 
ry thing was threatened with destruction. In the 
midst of this sublime and terrible storm, Dame Par- 
tington, who lived upon the beach, was seen at the 
door of her house with mop and pattens, trundling 
her mop, squeezing out the sea-water, and vigorously 
pushing away the Atlantic Ocean. The Atlantic was 
roused. Mrs. Partington's spirit was up ; but I need 
not tell you that the contest was unequal. The Atlan- 
tic Ocean beat Mrs. Partington. She was excellent at 
a slop, or a puddle, but she could not have meddled 
with a tempest. Gentlemen, be at your ease — be quiet 
and steady. You will beat Mrs. Partington. 

They tell you, gentlemen, in the debates by which 
we have been lately occupied, that the bill is not jus- 
tified by experience. I do not think this true, but if it 
were true, nations are sometimes compelled to act 
without experience for their guide, and to trust to 
their own sagacity for the anticipation of consequen- 
ces. The instances where this country has been com- 
pelled thus to act have been so eminently success- 
ful, that I see no cause for fear, even if we were acting 
in the manner imputed to us by our enemies. What 
precedents and what experience were there at the Re- 
formation, when the country, with one unanimous 
effort, pushed out the pope, and his grasping and am- 
bitious clergy? What experience, when, at the Revo- 
lution, we drove away our ancient race of kings, and 
chose another family more congenial to our free prin- 
ciples ? And yet to those two events, contrary to ex- 
perience, and unguided by precedents, we owe all our 
domestic happiness, and civil and religious freedom — 
and having got rid of corrupt priests and despotic 
kings, by our sense and our courage, are we now to be 
intimidated by the awful danger of extinguishing bo- 
roughmongers, and shaking from our necks the igno- 
minious yoke which their baseness has imposed upon 
us ? Go on, they say, as you have done for these hun- 
dred years last past. I answer, it is impossible — five 
hundred people now write and read, where one hun- 
dred wrote and read fifty years ago. The iniquities 
and enormities of the borough system are now known 



258 



WORKS OF THE REV. SIDNEY SMITH. 



to the meanest of the people. You have a different 
sort of men to deal with— you must change, because 
the beings whom you govern are changed. After all, 
and to be short, I must say that it has always appear- 
ed to me to be the most absolute nonsense that we 
cannot be a great, or a rich and happy nation, without 
suffering ourselves to be bought and sold every five 
years like a pack of negro slaves. I hope I am not a 
very rash man, but I would launch boldly into this 
experiment without any fear of consequences, and I 
believe there is not a man here present who would 
not cheerfully embark with me. As to the enemies 
of the bill, who pretend to be reformers, I know them, 
I believe, better than you do, and I earnestly caution 
you against them. You will have no more of reform 
than they are compelled to grant ; you will have no 
reform at all, if they can avoid it— you will be hurried 
into a war to turn your attention from reform. They 
do not understand you ; they will not believe in the 
improvement you have made ; they think the English 
of the present day are as the English of the times of 
Queen Anne or George the First. They know no more 
of the present state of their own country, than of the 
state of the Esquimaux Indians. Gentlemen, I view 
the ignorance of the present state of the country with 
the most serious concern, and I believe they will one 
day or another waken into conviction with horror and 
dismay. I will omit no means of rousing them to a 
sense of their danger : for this object I cheerfully 
sign the petition proposed by Dr. Kinglake, which I 
consider to be the wisest and most moderate of the 



SPEECH BY THE REV. SIDNEY SMITH. 

Stick to the bill— it is your Magna Charta and your 
Runnymede. King John made a present to the barons. 
King William has made a similar present to you. Never 
mind, common qualities good in common times. If a 
man does not vote for the bill, he is unclean, the plague- 
spot is upon him ; push him into the lazaretto of the 
last century, with Wetherell and Sadler ; purify the air 
before you approach him ; bathe your hands in chlo- 
ride of lime, if you have been contaminated by his 
touch. 

So far from its being a merely theoretical improve- 
ment, I put it to any man, who is himself embarked 
in a profession, or has sons in the same situation, if 
the unfair influence of boroughmongers has not per- 
petually thwarted him in his lawful career of ambition, 
and professional emolument ? < I have been in three 
general engagements at sea,' said an old sailor — 
1 have been twice wounded ; I commanded the boats 
when the French frigate, the Astrolabe, was cut out 
so gallantly.' l Then you are made a post captain?' 
< No. I was very near it ; but — Lieutenant Thomson 
cut me out, as I cut out the French frigate ; his father 
is town clerk of the borough for which Lord F 



what right has this lord, or that marquis, to buy ten 
seats in Parliament, in the shape of boroughs, and 
then to make laws to govern me ? And how are these 
masses of power re-distributed? The eldest son of 
my lord is just come from Eton — he knows a good 
deal about iEneas and Dido, Apollo and Daphne— 
and that is all ; and to this boy, his father gives a 
six-hundredth part of the power of making laws, as he 
would give him a horse, or a double-barrelled gun. 
Then Vellum, the steward, is put in— an admirable 
man ; — he has raised the estates — watched the pro- 
gress of the family road, and canal bills— and Vellum 
shall help to rule over the people of Israel. A neigh- 
bouring country gentleman, Mr. Plumpkin, hunts with 
my lord — opens him a gate or two, while the hounds 
are running — dines with my lord— agrees with my 
lord — wishes he could rival the Southdown sheep of 
my lord— and upon Plumpkin is conferred a portion of 
the government. Then there is a distant relation of 
the same name, in the county militia, with white 
teeth, who calls up the carriage at the opera, and is 
always wishing O'Connell was hanged, drawn, and 
quartered — then a barrister, who has written an article 
in the Quarterly, and is very likely to speak, and re- 
fute M'Culloch ; and these five people, in whose nomi- 
nation I have no more agency than I have in the 
nomination of the toll keepers of the Bosphorus, are 
to make laws for me and my family— to put their 
hands in my purse, and to sway the future destinies 
of this country ; and when the neighbours step in, and 
beg permission to say a few words before these persons 
are chosen, there is an universal cry of ruin confu- 
sion, and destruction ;— we have become a great people 
under Vellum and Plumpkin— under Vellum and 
Plumpkin our armies have secured the strength of the 
hills— to turn out Vellum and Plumpkin is not reform, 
but revolution. 

Was there ever such a ministry ? Was there ever 
before a real ministry of the people ? Look at the 
condition of the country when it was placed in their 
hands: the state of the house when, the incoming- 
tenant took possession: windows broken, chimneys 
on fire, mobs round the house threatening to pull it 
down, roof tumbling, rain pouring in. It was courage 
to occupy it ; it was a miracle to save it ; it will be 
the glory of glories to enlarge and expand it, and to 
make it the eternal palace of wise and temperate 
freedom. 

Proper examples have been made among the un- 
happy and misguided disciples of Swing : a rope has 
been carried round O'Connell's legs, and a ring in- 
serted in Cobbett's nose. Then the game laws ! ! ! 
Was ever conduct so shabby as that of the two or: 
three governments which preceded that of Lord Grey l '' 
The cruelties and enormities of this code had beenn 
thoroughly exposed; and a general conviction existed 
of the necessity of a change. Bills were brought iv 
by various gentlemen, containing some trifling altera- 



is member, and there my chance was finished.' In 
the same manner, all over England, you will find great 
scholars rotting on curacies, brave captains starving 
in garrets, profound lawyers decayed and mouldering 
in the inns of court, because the parsons, warriors, and 
advocates of boroughmongers must be crammed to 
saturation, before there is a morsel of bread for the 
man who does not sell bis votes, and put his country 
up to auction ; and though this is of every day occur- 
rence, the borough system, we are told, is no practical 
evil. 

Who can bear to walk through a slaughter-house ? 
blood, garbage, stomachs, entrails, legs, tails, kid- 
neys, horrors — I often walk a mile to avoid it. What 
a scene of disgust and horror is an election— the base 
and infamous traffic of principles— a candidate of high 
character reduced to such means — the perjury and 
evasion of agents — the detestable rapacity of voters — 
the ten days' dominion of mammon and Belial. The 
bill lessens it — begins the destruction of such practi- 
ces^ — affords some chance and some means of turning 
public opinion against bribery, and of rendering it in- 
famous. 
But the thing I cannot, and will not bear, is this ;— 



tion in this abominable code, and even these were 
sacrificed to the tricks and manoeuvres of some noble 
Nimrod, who availed himself of the emptiness of the 
town in July, and flung out the bill. Government 
never stirred a step. The fulness of the prisons, the 
wretchedness and demoralization of the poor, never 
came across them. The humane and considerate Peel 
never once offered to extend his aegis over them. Ill 
had nothing to do with the state of party ; and some< 
of their double-barrelled voters might be offended. In- 
the mean time, for every ten pheasants which fluttered 
in the wood, one English peasant was rotting in jail. 
No sooner is Lord Althorp chancellor of the exche- 
quer, than he turns out of the house a trumpery anc 
(perhaps) an insiduous bill for the improvement o> 
the game laws ; and in an instant offers the assistance 
of government for the abolition of the whole code. 

Then look at the gigantic Brougham, sworn in a 
twelve o'clock, and before six, has a bill on the tabl< 
abolishing the abuses of a court which has been th< 
curse of the people of England for centuries. Fo: 
twenty-five long years did Lord Eldon sit in that court 
surrounded with misery and sorrow, which he neve 
held up a finger to alleviate. The widow and th 
orphan cried to him as vainly as the town crier crie 



SPEECH ON THE REFORM BILL. 



when he offers a small reward for a full purse ; the 
bankrupt of the court became the lunatic of the court ; 
estates mouldered away, and mansions fell down ; but 
the fees came in, and all was well. But in an instant 
the iron mace of Brougham shivered to atoms this 
house of fraud and of delay ; and this is the man who 
will help to govern you ; who bottoms his reputation 
on doing good to you; who knows, that to reform 
abuses is the safest basis of fame and the surest in. 
strument of power; who uses the highest gifts of 
reason, and the most splendid efforts of genius, to 
rectify those abuses, which all the genius and talent 
of the profession* have hitherto been employed to 
justify, and to protect. Look to Brougham, and turn 
you to that side where he waves his long and lean 
finger; and mark well that face which nature has 
marked so forcibly — which dissolves pensions — turns 
jobbers into honest men — scares away the plunderer of 
the public — and is a terror to him who doeth evil to 
the people. But, above all, look to the northern earl, 
victim, before this honest and manly reign, of the 
spitefulness of the court. You may now, for the first 
time, learn to trust in the professions of a minister ; 
you are directed by a man who prefers character to 
place, and who has given such unequivocal proofs of 
honesty and patriotism, that his image ought to be 
amongst your household gods, and his name to be 
lisped by your children; two thousand years hence it 
will be a legend like the fable of Perseus and Andro- 
meda : Britannia chained to a mountain — two hundred 
rotten animals menacing her destruction, till a tall 
earl, armed with schedule A., and followed by his 
page Russell, drives them into the deep, and delivers 
over Britannia in safety to crowds of ten-pound rent- 
ers, who deafen the air with their acclamations. 
Forthwith, Latin verses upon this — school exercises — 
boys whipt, and all the usual absurdities of education. 
Don't part with an administration composed of Lord 
Grey and Lord Brougham; and not only these, but I 
look at them all — the mild wisdom of Lansdowne — the 
i genius aftd extensive knowledge of Holland, in whose 
bold and honest life there is no varying nor shadow of 
[change — the unexpected and exemplary activity of 
iLord Melbourne — and the rising parliamentary talents 
jof Stanley. You are ignorant of your best interests, 
;if every vote you can bestow is not given to such a 
[ministry as this. 

You will soon find an alteration of behaviour in the 
upper orders when elections become real. You will 
find that you are raised to the importance to which 
you ought to be raised. The merciless ejector, the 
I rural tyrant, will be restrained within the limits of 
decency and humanity, and will improve their own 
characters, at the same time that they better your 
condition. 

It is not the power of aristocracy that will be de- 
stroyed by these measures, but the unfair power. If 
the Duke of Newcastle is kind and obliging to his 
neighbours, he will probably lead his neighbours ; if 
jhe is a man of sense, he will lead them more certainly, 
and to a better purpose. All this is as it should be ; 
but the Duke of Newcastle, at present, by buying cer- 
tain old houses, could govern his neighbours, and 
legislate for them, even if he had not five grains of 
understanding, and if he were the most churlish and 
brutal man under heaven. The present state of things 
renders unnecessary all those important virtues, 
which rich and well-born men, under a better system, 
[would exercise for the public good. The Duke of 
Newcastle (I mention him only as an instance,) Lord 
Exeter will do as well, but either of those noblemen, 
depending not upon walls, arches, and abutments, for 
their power— but upon mercy, charity, forbearance, 
iindulgence, and example — would pay this price, and 
lead the people by their affections ; one would be the 
God of Stamford, and the other of Newark. This 
union of the great with the many is the real healthy 
state of a country; such a country is strong to invin- 
cibility—and this strength the borough system entirely 
destroys. 

Lord Lyndhurst is an exception; I firmly believe he had 
no wish to perpetuate the abuses- of the Court of Chancery. 



Cant words creep in and affect quarrels ; the chan- 
ges are rung between revolution and reform; but, first 
settle whether a wise government ought to attempt 
the measure — whether any thing is wanted — whether 
less would do — and having settled this, mere nomen- 
clature becomes of very little consequence. But, af- 
ter all, if it is revolution, and not reform, it will only 
induce me to receive an old political toast in a twofold 
meaning, and with twofold pleasure. When King 
William and the great and glorious Revolution are gi- 
ven, I shall think not only of escape from bigotry, but 
exemption from corruption ; and I shall thank Provi- 
dence, which lias given us a second King William for 
the destruction of vice, as the other, of that name, 
was given us for the conservation of freedom. 

All formal political changes, proposed by these very 
men, it is said, were mild and gentle, compared to 
this ; true, but are you on Saturday night to seize your 
apothecary by the throat, and to say to him ' Subtle 
compounder, fraudulent posologist, did not you order 
me a dram of this medicine on Monday morning, and 
now you declare that nothing short of an ounce can do 
me any good V ' True enough,' would he of the 
phials reply, u but you did not take the dram on Mon- 
day morning — that makes all the difference, my dear 
sir ; if you had done as I advised you at first, the 
small quantity of medicine would have sufficed ; and 
instead of being in a night-gown and slippers up stairs, 
you would have been walking vigorously in Piccadil- 
ly. Do as you please — and die if you please ; but 
don't blame me because you desjnsed my advice, and 
by your own ignorance and obstinacy have entailed 
upon yourself ten-fold rhubarb, and unlimited infusion 
of senna.' 

Now see the consequences of having a manly lead- 
er, and a manly cabinet. Suppose they had come out 
with a little ill-fashioned seven months' reform ; what 
would have been the consequence ? The same oppo- 
sition from the tories — that would have been quite cer- 
tain — and not a single reformer in England satisfied 
with the measure. You have now a real reform, and 
a fair share of power delegated to the people. 

The anti-reformers cite the increased power of the 
press — this is the very reason why I want an increas- 
ed power in the House of Commons The Times, He- 
rald, Advertiser, Globe, Sun, Courier, and Chronicle 
are an heptarchy, which govern this country, and go- 
vern it because the people are so badly represented. 
I am perfectly satisfied, that with a fair and honest 
House of Commons the power of the press would di- 
minish—and that the greatest authority would centre 
in the highest place. 

Is it possible for a gentleman to get into Parliament, 
at present, without doing things he is utterly ashamed 
of — without mixing himself up with the lowest and 
basest of mankind? Hands, accustomed to the scent- 
ed lubricity of soap, are defiled with pitch, and con- 
taminated with filth. Is there not some inherent vice 
in a government, which cannot be carried on but with 
such abominable wickedness, in which no gentleman 
can mingle without moral degradation ; and the prac- 
tice of crimes, the very imputation of which, on other 
occasions, he would repel at the hazard of his 
life? 

What signifies a small majority in the house ? The 
miracle is, that there should have been any majority 
at all ; that there was not an immense majority on the 
other side. It was a very long period before the 
courts of justice in Jersey could put down smuggling ; 
and why? The judges, counsel, attorneys, crier of 
the court, grand and petty jurymen, were all smug- 
glers, and the high sheriff and the constables were 
running goods every moonlight night. 

How are you to do without a government ! And 
what other government, if this bill is ultimately lost, 
could possibly be found ? How could any country de- 
fray the ruinous expense of protecting, with troops and 
constables, the Duke of Wellington and Sir Robert 
Peel, who literally would not be able to walk from the 
Horse Guards to Grosvenor Square, without two or 
three regiments of foot to screen them from the mob ; 
and in these hollow squares the hero of Waterloo 
would have to spend his political life. By the whole 



WORKS OF THE REV. SIDNEY SMITH. 



exercise of his splendid military talents, by strong 
batteries at Bootle's, and White's, he might, on 
nights of great debate, reach the House of Lords ; but 
Sir Robert would probably be cut off, and nothing 
could save Twiss and Lewis. 

The great majority of persons returned by the new 
boroughs would either be men of high reputation for 
talents, or persons of fortune known in the neighbour- 
hood; they have property and character to lose. 
Why are they to plunge into mad and revolutionary 
projects of pillaging the public creditor ? It is not the 
interest of any such man to do it ; he would lose more 
by the destruction of public credit than he would gain 
by a remission of what he paid for the interest of the 
public debt. And if it is not the interest of any one to 
act in this manner, it is not the interest of the mass. 
How many, also, of these new legislators would there 
be, who were not themselves creditors of the state ? 
Is it the interest of such men to create a revolution, 
by destroying the constitutional power of the House of 
Lords, or of the king ? Does there exist in persons of 
that class, any disposition for such changes ? Are not 
all feelings, and opinions and prejudices, on the oppo- 
site side ? The majority of the new members will be 
landed gentleman : their genus is utterly distinct from 
the revolutionary tribe ; they have molar teeth : they 
are destitute of the carnivorous and incisive jaws of 
political adventurers. 

There will be mistakes at first, as there are in all 
changes. All young ladies will imagine (as*^ soon as 
this bill is carried) that they will be instantly mar- 
ried. Schoolboys believe that gerunds and supines 
will be abolished, and that currant tarts must ultimate- 
ly come down in price ; the corporal and sergeant are 
sure of double pay ; bad poets will expect a demand 
ior their epics ; fools will be disappointed, as they al- 
ways are ; reasonable men, who know what to ox- 
pect, will find that a very serious good has been ob- 
tained. 

What good to the hewer of wood and the drawer of 
water ? How is he benefited, if old Sarum is abolish- 
ed, and Birmingham members created ? But if you 
ask this question of reform, you must ask it of a great 
number of other measures. How is he benefited by 
Catholic emancipation, by the repeal of the Corpora- 
tion and Test Act, by the Revolution of 1688, by any 
great political change ? by a good government ? In 
the first place, if many are benefited, and the lower or- 
ders are not injured, this alone is reason enough for 
the change. But the hewer of wood and the drawer 
of water are benefited by reform. Reform will pro- 
duce economy and investigation; there will be fewer 
jobs, and a less lavish expenditure ; wars will not be 
persevered in for years after the people are tired of 
them ; taxes will be taken off the poor and laid upon 
the rich ; democratic habits will "be more common in a 
country where the rich are forced to court the poor for 
political power; cruel and oppressive punishments 
(such as those for night poaching), will be abolished. 
If you steal a pheasant you will be punished as you 
ought to be, but not sent away from your wife and 
children for seven years. Tobacco will be 2d. per lb. 
cheaper. Candles will fall in price. These last re- 
sults of an improved government will be felt. We do 
not pretend to abolish poverty or to prevent wretched- 
ness; but if peace, economy, and justice, are the re- 
sults of reform, a number of small benefits, or rather 
of benefits which appear small to us but not to them, 
will accrue to millions of the people ; and the connec- 
tion between the existence of John Russell, and the 
reduced price of bread and cheese, wUl be as clear as 
it has been the object of his honest, wise, and useful 
life to make it. 

Don't be led away by such nonsense ; all things 
are dearer under a bad government, and cheaper under 
a good one. The real question they ask you is, What 
difference can any change of government make to 
you? They want to keep the bees from buzzing 
and stinging, in order that they may rob the hive in 
peace. 

Work well ! How does it work well, when every 
human being in doors and out (with the exception of 



the Duke of Wellington), says it must be made to work 
better, or it will soon cease to work at all? It is lit- 
tle short of absolute nonsense to call a government 
good, which the great mass of Englishmen would, be. 
fore twenty years were elapsed, if reform was denied, 
rise up and destroy. Of what use have all the cruel 
laws been of Perceval, Eldon, and Castlereagh, to ex- 
tinguish reform ? Lord John Russell and his abettors 
would have been committed to jail twenty years ago 
for half only of his present reform ; and now relays of 
the people would drag them from London to Edin- 
burgh ; at which latter city we are told by Mr, Dun- 
das, that there is no eagerness for reform. Five min- 
utes before Moses struck the rock, this gentleman 
would have said that there was no eagerness for 
water. 

There are two methods of making alterations : the 
one is to despise the applicants, to begin with re- 
fusing every concession, then to relax by making con- 
cessions which are always too late ; by offering in 
1831 what is then too late, but would have been ac- 
cepted in 1830 — gradually to O'Connellize the country, 
till at last, after this process has gone on for some 
time, the alarm becomes too great, and every thing is 
conceded in hurry and confusion. In the mean time 
fresh conspiracies have been hatched by the long de 
lay, and no gratitude is expressed for what has been 
extorted by fear. In this way, peace was concluded 
with America and emancipation granted to the Catho- 
lics ; and in this way the war of complexion will be 
finished in the West Indies. The other method is, to 
see at a distance that the thing must be done, and to 
do it effectually, and at once ; to take it out of the 
hands of the common people, and to carry the mea-" 
sure in a manly liberal manner, so as to satisfy the 
great majority. The merit of this belongs to the ad- 
ministration of Lord Grey. He is the only minister I 
know of who has begun a great measure in good time, 
conceded at the beginning of twenty years what would 
have been extorted at the end of it, and prevented 
that folly, violence, and ignorance, which emanate 
from a long denial and extorted concession of justice 
to great masses of human beings. I believe the ques 
tion of reform, or any dangerous agitation of it, is set 
at rest for thirty or forty years ; and this is an eternity 
in politics. 

Boroughs are not the power proceeding from wealth. 
Many men, who have no boroughs, are infinitely rich- 
er than those who have—but it is the artifice of wealth 
in seizing hold of certain localities. The borough- 
monger is like rheumatism, which owes its power not 
not so much to the intensity of the pain as to its pecu- 
liar position ; a little higher up, or a little lower down, , 
the same pain would be trifling ; but it fixes in the i 
joints, and gets into the head quarters of motion and I 
activity. The boroughmonger knows the importance 
of arthritic positions ; he disdains muscle, gets into the 
joints, and lords it over the whole machine by felicity 
of place. Other men are as rich— but those riches are 
not fixed in the critical spot. 

I live a good deal with all ranks and descriptions 
of people ; I am thoroughly convinced that the party 
of democrats and republicans are very small and con- 
temptible ; that the English love their institutions— 
that they love not only this king, (who would not love i 
him?) but the kingly office— that they have no hatred I 
to the aristocracy. I am not afraid of trusting Eng- 
lish happiness to English gentlemen. I believe that 
the half million of new voters will choose much better 
for the public than the twenty or thirty peers, to whose 
usurped power they succeed. 

If any man doubts the power of reform, let him 
take these two memorable proofs of its omnipotence. 
First, but for the declaration against it, I believe the 
Duke of Wellington might this day have been in of- 
fice • and, secondly, in the whole course of the debates i 
at county meetings and in Parliament, there are not 
twenty men who have declared against reform Some 
advance an inch, some a foot, some a yard — but no« 
body stands still— nobody says, We ought to remain I 
just where we were—every body discovers that he is a 
reformer, and has long been so— and appears infinitely 



BALLOT. 



delighted with this new view of himself. Nobody ap- 
pears without the cockade— bigger or less— but always 
the cockade. 

An exact and elaborate census is called for — vast in- 
formation should have been laid upon the table of the 
House — great time should have been given for delibe- 
ration. All these objections, being turned into Eng- 
lish, simply mean, that the chances of another year 
should have been given for defeating the bill. In that 
time the Poles may be crushed, the Belgians organ- 
ized, Louis Philip dethroned ; war may rage all over 
Europe — the popular spirit may be diverted to other 
objects. It is certainly provoking that the ministry 
foresaw all these possibilities, and determined to mod- 
el the iron while it was red and glowing. 

It is not enough that a political institution works 
well practically : it must be defensible ; it must be 
such as will bear discussion, and not excite ridicule 
and contempt. It might work well for aught I know, 
if, like the savages of Onelashka, we sent out to catch 
a king : but who could defend a coronation by chase ? 
who can defend the payment of 40,000/. for the three- 
hundredth part of the power of Parliament, and the 
re-sale of this power to government for places to the 
Lord Williams, and Lord Charles's, and others of the 
Anglophagi ? Teach a million of the common people 
to read— and such a government (work it ever so well) 
must perish in twenty years. It is impossible to per- 
suade the mass of mankind, that there are not other 
and better methods of governing a country. It is so 
complicated, so wicked, such envy and hatred accu- 
mulate against the gentlemen who have fixed them- 
selves on the joints, that it cannot fail to perish, and 
to be driven as it is driven from the country, by a 
general burst of hatred and detestation. I meant, gen- 
tlemen, to have spoken for another half-hour, but I am 
old and tired. Thank me for ending— but, gentlemen, 
bear with me for another moment ; one word before I 
end. I am old, but I thank God I have lived to see 
more than my observations on human nature taught 
me I had any right to expect. I have lived to see an 
honest king, in whose word his ministers can trust ; 
who disdains to deceive those men whom he has call- 
ed to the public service, but makes common cause 
with them for the common good ; and exercises the 
highest powers of a ruler for the dearest interests of 
the state. I have lived to see a king with a good 
heart, who, surrounded by nobles thinks of common 
men; who loves the great mass of English people, 
and wishes to be loved by them ; who knows that his 
real power, as he feels that his happiness, is founded 
on their affection. I have* lived to see a king, who, 
without pretending to the pomp of superior in- 
tellect, has the wisdom to see, that the decayed insti- 
tutions of human policy require amendment ; and who, 
in spite of clamour, interest, prejudice, and fear, has 
the manliness to carry these wide changes into imme- 
diate execution. Gentlemen, farewell : shout for the 
king. 



BALLOT. 

It is possible, and perhaps not very difficult, to in- 
vent a machine/by the aid of which electors may vote 
for a candidate, or for two or three candidates, out of 
a greater number, without its being discovered for 
whom they vote ; it is less easy than the rabid and 
foaming radical supposes ; but I have no doubt it may 
be accomplished. In Mr. Grote's dagger ballot box, 
which has been carried round the country by eminent 
patriots, you stab the card of your favourite candidate 
with a dagger. I have seen another, called the mouse- 
trap ballot box, in which you poke your finger into the 
trap of the member you prefer, and are caught and 
detained till the trap-clerk below (who knows by 
means of a wire when you are caught) marks your 
vote, pulls the liberator, and releases you. Which 
may be the most eligible of these two methods I do 
not pretend to determine, nor do I think my excellent 
friend Mr. Babbage has 'as yet made up his mind on 
the subject ; but, by some means or other, I have no 
doubt the thing may be done. 



Landed proprietors imagine they have a right to the 
votes of their tenants ; and instances, in every election, 
are numerous where tenants have been dismissed fo* 
voting contrary to the wishes of their landlords. In 
the same manner strong combinations are made against 
tradesmen who have chosen to think and act for them- 
selves in political matters, rather than yield their 
opinions to the solicitations of their customers. There 
is a great dqal of tyranny and injustice in all this. I 
should no mofe think of asking what the political opin- 
ions of a shop-keeper were than of asking whether he 
was tall or short, or large or small : for a difference of 
2 1-2 per cent., I would desert the most aristocratic 
butcher that ever existed, and deal with one who 

< Shook the arsenal and fulmin'd over Greece.' 

On the contrary, I would not adhere to the man who 
put me in uneasy habiliments, however great his ven- 
eration for trial by jury, or however ardent his attach- 
ment to the liberty of the subject. A tenant I never 
had ; but I firmly believe that if he had gone through 
certain pecuniary formalities twice a year, I should 
have thought it a gross act of tyranny to have inter- 
fered either with his political or his religious opin- 
ions. 

I distinctly admit that every man has a right to do 
what he pleases with his own. I cannot, by law, pre- 
vent any one from discharging his tenants and chang- 
ing his tradesmen for political reasons ; but I may 
judge whether that man exercises his right to the pub- 
lic advantage. A man has a right to refuse dealing 
with any tradesman who is not five feet eleven inches 
high ; but if he acts upon this rule, he is either a mad- 
man or a fool. He has a right to lay waste his own 
estate, and to make it utterly barren ; but I have also 
a right to point him out as one who exercises his right 
in a manner very injurious to society. He may set up 
a religious or a political test for his tradesmen ; but 
admitting his right, and deprecating all interference 
of law, I must tell him he is making the aristocracy 
odious to the great mass, and that he is sowing the 
seeds of revolution. His purse may be full, and his 
fields may be wide ; but the moralist will still hold 
the rod of public opinion over his head, and tell the 
money-bloated blockhead that he is shaking those 
laws of propriety which it has taken ages to extort 
from the wretchedness' and rapacity of mankind ; and 
that what he calls his own will not long be his own, if 
he tramples too heavily upon human patience. 

All these practices are bad ; but the facts and the 
consequences are exaggerated. 

In the first place, the plough is not a political ma- 
chine : the loom and the steam-engine are furiously 
political, but the plough is not. Nineteen tenants out 
of twenty care nothing about their votes, and pull off 
their opinions as easily to their landlords as they do 
their hats. As far as the great majority of tenants are 
concerned, these histories of persecution are mere de- 
clamatory nonsense ; they have no more predilection 
for whom they vote than the organ pipes have for 
what tunes they are to play. A tenant dismissed for 
a fair and just cause often attributes his dismissal to 
political motives, and endeavours to make himself a 
martyr with the public : a man who ploughs badly, or 
who pays badly, says he is dismissed for his vote 
No candidate is willing to allow that he has lost his 
election by his demerits ; and he seizes hold of these 
stories, and circulates them with the greatest avidity: 
they are stated in the House of Commons ; John Rus- 
sell and Spring Rice fall a crying : there is lamenta- 
tion of liberals in the land ; and many groans for the 
territorial tyrants. 

A standing reason against the frequency of dismis- 
sal of tenants is, that it is always injurious to the pe- 
cuniary interests of a landlord to dismiss a tenant ; the 
property always suffers in some degree by a going off 
tenant ; and it is therefore always the interest of a 
landlord not to change when the tenant does his duty 
as an agriculturalist. 

To part with tenants for political reasons always 
makes a landlord unpopular. The Constitutional, 
price Ad. ; the Cato, at 3fJ. ; and the Lucius Junius 
Brutus at 2d., all set upon the unhappy scutiger ; and 



WORKS OF THE REV. SIDNEY SMITH. 



the squire, unused to be pointed at, and thinking that 
all Europe and part of Asia are thinking of him and 
his farmers, is driven to the brink of suicide and de- 
spair. That such things are done is not den'.ed; that 
they are scandalous when they are done i< equally 
true ; but these are reasons why such acts are less 
frequent than they are commonly represented to be. 
In the same manner, there are instances of shopkeep- 
ers being materially injured in their business from the 
votes they have given ; but the facts themselves, as 
well as the consequences, are grossly exaggerated. If 
shopkeepers lose tory they gain whig customers ; and 
it is not always the vote which does the mischief, but 
the low vulgar impertinence, and the unbridled scur- 
rility of a man who thinks that by dividing to man- 
kind their rations of butter and of cheese he has qual- 
ified himself for legislation, and that he can hold the 
rod of empire because he has wielded the yard of men- 
suration. I detest all inquisition into political opinions, 
but I have very rarely seen a combination against any 
tradesman who modestly, quietly, and conscientiously 
took his own line in politics. But Brutus and butter- 
man, cheesemonger and Cato, do not harmonize well 
together ; good taste is offended, the coxcomb loses 
his friends, and general disgust is mistaken for com- 
bined oppression. Shopkeepers, too, are very apt to 
cry out before they are hurt : a man who sees after ah 
election one of his" customers buying a pair of gloves 
on the opposite side of the way, roars out that his 
honesty will make him a bankrupt, and the county pa- 
pers are filled with letters from Brutus, Publicola, 
Hampden, and Pym. 

This interference with the freedom of voting, bad as 
it is, produces no political deliberation ; it does not 
make the tories stronger than the whigs, nor the whigs 
than the tories, for both are equally guilty of this spe- 
cies of tyranny ; and any particular system of meas- 
ures fails or prevails, much as if no such practice ex- 
isted. The practice had better not be at all, but if 
a certain quantity of the evil does exist, it is better 
that it should be equally divided among both parties, 
than that it should be exercised by one for the depres- 
sion of the other. There are politicians always at a 
white heat, who suppose that there are landed tyrants 
only on one side of the question ; but human life has 
been distressingly abridged by the flood : there is no 
time to spare , it is impossible to waste it upon such 
senseless bigotry. 

If a man is sheltered from intimidation, is it at all 
clear that he would vote from any better motive than 
intimidation? If you make so tremendous an experi- 
ment, are you sure of attaining your object ? The 
landlord has perhaps said a cross word to the tenant ; 
the candidate for whom the tenant votes in opposition 
to his landlord has taken his second son for a footman, 
or his father knew the candidate's grandfather : how 
many thousand votes, sheltered (as the ballotists sup- 
pose) from intimidation, would be given from such 
silly motives as these ? how many would be given 
from the mere discontent of inferiority? or from that 
strange simious schoolboy passion of giving pain to 
others, even when the author cannot be found out ? — 
motives as pernicious as any which could proceed from 
intimidation. So that, all voters screened by ballot 
would not be screened for any public good. 

The radicals, (I do not use this word in any offen- 
sive sense, for I know many honest and excellent men 
of this way of thinking), — but the radicals praise and 
admit the lawful influence of wealth and power. They 
are quite satisfied if a rich man of popular manners 
gains the votes and affections of his dependants ; but 
why is not this as bad as intimidation? The real ob- 
ject is to vote for the good politician, not for the kind- 
hearted or agreeable man : the mischief is just the 
same to the country whether I am smiled into a cor- 
rupt choice, or frowned into a corrupt choice, — what 
is it to me whether my landlord is the best of land- 
lords, or the most agreeable of men ? I must vote for 
Joseph Hume, if I think Joseph more honest than the 
marquis. The more mitigated radical may pass over 
this, but the real carnivorous variety of the animal 
should declaim as loudly against the fascinations as 
against the threats of the great. The man who pos- 



sesses the land should never speak to the man who 
tills it. The intercourse between landlord and tenant 
should be as strictly guarded as that of the sexes in 
Turkey. A funded duenna should be placed over 
every landed grandee. — And then intimidation ! Is 
intimidation confined to the aristocracy? Can any 
thing be more scandalous and atrocious than the in- 
timidation of mobs ? Did not the mob of Bristol occa- 
sion more ruin, wretchedness, death, and alarm than 
all the- ejection of tenants, and combinations against 
shopkeepers, from the beginning of the century? and 
did not the Scotch philosophers tear off the clothes of 
the tories in Mintoshire ? or at least such clothes as 
the customs of the country admit of being worn ? — and 
did not they, without any reflection at all upon the 
customs of the country, wash the tory voters in the 
river ? 

Some sanguine advocates of the ballot contend that 
it would put an end to all canvassing : why should it 
do so ! Under the ballot, I canvass (it is true) a per- 
son who may secretly deceive me. I cannot be sure 
he will not do so — but I am sure it is much less likely 
he will vote against me, when I have paid him all the 
deference and attention which a representative ■ be- 
stows on his constituents, than if I had totally 
neglected him : to any other objections he may have 
against me, at least I will not add that of personal in- 
civility. 

Scarcely is any great virtue practised without some 
sacrifice ; and the admiration which virtue excites 
seems to proceed from the contemplation of such suf- 
ferings, and of the exertions by which they are en- 
dured : a tradesman suffers some loss of trade by 
voting for his country ; is he not to vote ? he might 
suffer some loss of blood in fighting for his country ; is 
he not to fight ? Every one would be a good Samari- 
tan, if he was quite sure his compassion would cost 
him nothing. We should all be heroes, if it was not 
for blood and fractures ; all saints, if it were not for 
the restrictions and privations of sanctity ; all patriots, 
if it were not for the losses and misrepresentations to 
which patriotism exposes us. The ballotists are a set 
of Englishmen glowing with the love of England and 
the love of virtue, but determined to hazard the most 
dangerous experiments in politics, rather than run the 
risk of losing a penny in defence of their exalted feel- 
ings. 

An abominable tyranny exercised by the ballot is, 
that it compels those persons to conceal their votes, 
who hate all concealment, and who glory in the cause 
they support. If you are afraid to go in at the front 
door, and to say in a clear voice what you have to say, 
go in at the back door, and say it in a whisper — but 
this is not enough for you ; you make me, who am 
bold and honest, sneak in at the back door as well as 
yourself: because you are afraid of selling a dozen 01 
two of gloves less than usual, you compel me, who ' 
have no gloves to sell, or who would dare or despise 
the loss, if I had, to hide the best feelings of my heart, 
and to lower myself down to your mean morals It is 
as if a few cowards who could only fight behind walls 
and houses, were to prevent the whole regiment from 
showing a bold front in the field : what right has the 
coward to degrade me who am no coward, and put me 
hi the same shameful predicament with himself? It 
ballot is established, a zealous voter cannot do justice 
to his cause ; there will be so many false Hampdens, 
and spurious Catos, that all men's actions and motives 
will be mistrusted. It is in the power of any man to 
tell me that my colours are false, that I declaim with 
stimulated warmth, and canvass with fallacious zeal ; 
that I am a tory, though I call Russell for ever, or a 
whig, in spite of my obstreperous panegyrics of Peel. 
It is really a curious condition that all men must imi- 
tate the defects of a few, in order that it may not be 
known who have the natural imperfection, and who 
put it on from conformity. In this way, in former 
days, to hide the gray hairs of the old, every body 
was forced to wear powder and pomatum. 

It must not be forgetten that, in the ballot, conceal- 
ment must be absolutely compulsory. It would never 
do to let one man vote openly, and another secretly. 
You may go to the edge of the box, and say, ' I vote 



BALLOT. 



for A.,' but who knows that your ball is not put in for 
B. ? There must be a clear plain opportunity for tell- 
ing an undiscoverable lie, or the whole invention is at 
an end. How beautiful is the progress of man ! — 

Srinting has abolished ignorance — gas put an end to 
arkness — steam has conquered time and distance — it 
remained for Grote and his box to remove the incum- 
I brance of truth from human transactions. May we 
not look now for more little machines to abolish the 
other cardinal virtues. 

But if all men are suspected; if things are so con- 
trived that it is impossible to know what men really 
think, a serious impediment is created to the forma- 
tion of good public opinion in the multitude. There is 
a town (No. 1.) in which live two very clever and re- 
spectable men, Johnson and Pelham, small tradesmen, 
men always willing to run some risk for the public 
good, and to be less rich, and more houest than their 
neighbours. It is of considerable consequence to the 
formation of opinion in this town, as an example, to 
know how Johnson and Pelham vote. It guides the 
affections, and directs the understandings, of the whole 
population, and materially affects public opinion in 
this town ; and in another "borough, No. 2., it would be 
of the highest importance to public opinion if it were 
certain how Mr. Smith, the ironmonger, and Mr. Ro- 
gers, the London carrier, voted ; because they are 
both thoroughly honest men, and of excellent under- 
standing for their condition of life. Now, the tenden- 
cy of ballot would be to destroy all the Pelhams, 
Johnsons, Rogers's, and Smiths, to sow a universal 
mistrust, and to exterminate the natural guides and 
leaders of the people : political influence, founded 
upon honour and ancient honesty in politics, could not 
grow up under such a system. No man's declaration 
could get believed. It would be easy to whisper away 
the character of the best men ; and to assert that, in 
spite of all his declarations, which are nothing but a 
blind, the romantic Rogers has voted on the other 
side, and is in secret league with our enemies. 

' Who brought that mischievous profligate villain 
into Parliament ? Let us see the names of his real 
supporters. Who stood out against the strong and up- 
lifted arm of power? Who discovered this excellent 
and hitherto unknown person ? Who opposed the man 
whom we all know to be one of the first men in the 
country V Are these fair and useful questions to be 
veiled hereafter in impenetrable mystery ? Is this sort 
of publicity of no good as a restraint ? Is it of no good 
as an incitement to and a reward for exertions? Is 
not public opinion formed by such feelings ? aud is it 
not a dark aud demoralizing system to draw this veil 
over human actions, to say to the mass, be base, and 
you will not be despised ; be virtuous, and you will 
not be honoured ? Is this the way in which Mr. Grote 
would foster the spirit of a bold and indomitable peo- 
ple ? Was the liberty of that people established by 
fraud ? Did America lie herself into independence ? — 
Was it treachery which enabled Holland to shake off 
the yoke of Spain ? Is there any instance since the 
beginning of the world where human liberty has been 
established by little systems of trumpery and trick? — 
These are the weapons of monarchs against the peo- 
ple, not of the people against monarchs. With their 
own right hand, and with their mighty arm, have the 
people gotten to themselves the victory, and upon them 
may they ever depend; and then comes Mr. Grote. a 
scholar and a gentleman, and knowing all the histo- 
ries of public courage, preaches cowardice and treach- 
ery to England ; tells us that the bold cannot be free, 
and bids us seek for liberty by clothing ourselves in 
the mask of falsehood, and trampling on the cross of 
truth.* 

If this shrinking from the performance of duties is 
to be tolerated, voters are not the only persons Avho 
would recur to the accommodating convenience of bal- 
lot. A member of Parliament, who votes against gov- 
ernment, can get nothing in the army, navy, or church, 
or at the bar, for his children or himself; they are 

* Mr. Grote is a very worthy, honest, and able man ; and, 
ii the world were a chess-board, would be an important po- 
litician. 



placed on the north wall, and starved for their hones- 
ty. Judges, too, suffer for their unpopularity — Lord 
Kilwarden was murdered, Lord Mansfield burnt down ; 
but voters, forgetting that they are only trustees for 
those who have no vote, require that they themselves 
should be virtuous with impunity, and that all the pen- 
alties of austerity and Catonism should fall upon oth- 
ers. I am aware that it is of the greatest consequence 
to the constituent that he should be made acquainted 
with the conduct of his representative ; but I main- 
tain, that to know, without the fear of mistake, what 
the conduct of individuals has been in their fulfilment 
of the great trust of electing members of Parliament, 
is also of the greatest importance in the formation of 
public opinion ; and that, when men acted in the dark, 
the power of distinguishing between the bad and the 
good would be at an end. 

To institute ballot, is to apply a very dangerons in- 
novation to a temporary evil ; tor it is seldom, but in 
very excited times, that these acts of power are com- 
plained of which the ballot is intended to remedy. — 
There never was an instance in this country where 
parties were so nearly balanced ; but all this will pass 
away, and, in a very few years, either Peel will swal- 
low Lord John, or Lord John will pasture upon Peel; 
parties will coalesce, the Duke of Wellington and Vis- 
count Melbourne meet at the same board, and the lion 
lie down with the lamb. In the mean time a serious 
and dangerous political change is resorted to for the 
cure of a temporary evil, and we may be cursed with 
ballot when we do not want it, and cannot get rid of 
it. 

If there is ballot there can be no scrutiny, the con- 
trolling power of Parliament is lost, and the members 
are entirely in the hands of returning officers. 

An election is hard run — the returning officer lets in 
twenty votes which he ought to have excluded, and 
the opposite candidate is unjustly returned. I petition, 
and as the law now stands, the return would be amend- 
ed, and I, who had the legitimate majority, should be 
seated in Parliament. But how could justice be done 
if the ballot obtained, and if the returning officer were 
careless or corrupt? Would you put all the electors 
upon their oath ? Would it be advisable to accept any 
oath where detection was impossible ? and could any 
approximation to truth be expected under such circum- 
stances, from such an inquisition? It is true, the pre- 
sent committees of the House of Commons are a very 
unfair tribunal, but that tribunal may and will be 
mended ; and bad as that tribunal is, nobody can be 
insane enough to propose that we are to take refuge in 
the blunders or the corruptions of 600 returning offi- 
cers, 100 of whom are Irish. 

It is certainly in the power of a committee, when in- 
capacity or viliany of the returning officer has produc- 
ed an unfair return, to annul the whole election, and to 
proceed again de novo ; but how is this just ? or what 
satisfaction is this to me, who have unquestionably 
a lawful majority, and who ask of the House of Com- 
mons to examine the votes, and to place in their house 
the man who has combined the greatest number of 
suffrages ? The answer of the House of Commons is, 
' One of you is undoubtedly the rightful member, but 
we have so framed our laws of election, that it is im- 
possible to find out which that man is ; the loss and 
penalties ought only to fall upon one, but they must 
fall upon both ; we put the well-doer and the evil-doei 
precisely in the same situation ; there shall be no elec 
tion ;' and this may happen ten times running. 

Purity of election, the fair choice of representatives;, 
must be guarded either by the coercing power of the 
House of Commons exercised upon petitions, or it must 
be guarded by the watchful jealousy of opposite par- 
ties at the registrations ; but if (as the radicals sup- 
pose) ballot gives a power of perfect concealment, 
whose interest is it to watch the registrations ? If I 
despair of distinguishing my friends from my foes, 
why should I take any trouble about registrations ?— 
Why not leave every thing to that great primum mo 
bile of all human affairs, the barrister of six years 
standing ? 

The answer of the excellent Benthamites to all this 
is, l What you say may be true enough in the present 



264 



WORKS OF THE REV. SIDNEY SMITH. 



state of registrations, but we have another scheme of 
registration to which these objections will not apply.' 
There is really no answering this Paulo post legisla- 
tion. I reason now upon registration and reform which 
are in existence, which I have seen at work for several 
years. What new improvements are in the womb of 
time, or (if time has no womb) in the more capacious 
pockets of the followers of Bentham, I know not : — 
when I see them tried, I will reason upon them. There 
is no end to these eternal changes ; we have made an 
enormous revolution within the last ten years, — let us 
stop a little and secure it, and prevent it from being 
turned into ruin ; I do not say the reform bill is final, 
but I want a little time for breathing ; and if there are 
to be any more changes, let them be carried into exe- 
cution hereafter by those little legislators who are now 
receiving every day after dinner a cake or a plumb, in 
happy ignorance of Mr. Grote and his ballot. I long 
for. the quiet times of Log, when all the English com- 
mon people are making calico, and all the English 
gentlemen are making long and short verses, with no 
other interruption of their happiness than when false 
quantities are discovered in one or the other. 

What is to become of petitions if ballot is establish- 
ed ? Are they to be open as they now are, or are 
they to be conducted by ballot ? Are the radical shop- 
keepers and the radical tenant to be exposed (as they 
say) to all the fury of incensed wealth and power, and 
is that protection to be denied to them in petitions, 
Which is so loudly demanded in the choice of represen- 
tatives? Are there to be two distinct methods of as- 
certaining the opinions of the people, and these com- 
pletely opposed to each other? A member is chosen 
this week by a large majority of voters who vote in 
the dark, and the next week, when men vote in the 
light of day, some petition is carried totally opposite 
to all those principles for which the member with in- 
visible votes was returned to Parliament. How, under 
such a system, can Parliament ever ascertain what the 
wishes of the people really are ? The representatives 
are radicals, the petitioners eminently conservative ; 
the voice is the voice of Jacob, but the hands are the 
hands of Esau. 

And if the same protection is adopted for petitions 
as is given in elections, and if both are conducted by 
ballot, how is the House of Commons to deal with pe- 
titions ? When it is intended particularly that a pe- 
tition should attract the attention of the House of 
Commons, some member bears witness to the respec- 
tability or the futility of the signatures ; and how is it 
possible, without some guides of this kind, that the 
House could form any idea of the value and impor- 
tance of the petition ? 

These observations apply with equal force to the 
communications between the representative and the 
constituent. It is the radical doctrine that a represen- 
tative is to obey the instructions of his constituents. 
He has been elected under the ballot by a large ma- 
jority ; an open meeting is called, and he receives in- 
structions in direct opposition to all those principles 
upon which he has been elected. Is this the real 
opinion of his constituents ? and if he receives his 
instructions for a ballot meeting, who are his instruc- 
tors ? The lowest men in the town, or the wisest and 
the best? — But if ballot is established for elections on- 
ly, and all communications between the constituents 
on one side, and Parliament and the representatives 
on the.other, are carried on in open meetings, then are 
there two publics according to the radical doctrines, 
essentially different from each other ; the one acting 
under the influence of the rich and powerful, the other 
free ; and if all political petitions are to be carried r on 
by ballot, how is Parliament to know who petitions, r or 
the member to know who instructs ? 

I have hitherto spoken of ballot, as if it were, as the 
radicals suppose it to be, a mean of secrecy ; their very 
cardinal position is, that landlords, after the ballot is 
established, will give up in despair all hopes of com- 
manding the votes of their tenants. L scarcely ever 
heard a more foolish and gratuitous assumption. Given 
up ? Why should they be given up ? I can give many 
reasons why landlords should never exercise this un- 
reasonable power, but I can give no possible reason 



I why a man determined to do so should be baffled by 
the ballot. When two great parties in the empire are 
I combating for the supreme power, does Mr. Grote 
imagine, that the man of woods, forests, and rivers, — 
that they who have the strength of the hills, — are to 
be baffled by bumpkins thrusting a little pin into a little 
card in a little box? that England is to be governed by 
political acupuncturation ? 

A landlord who would otherwise be guilty of the 
oppression will not change his purpose, because you 
attempt to outwit him by the invention of the ballot ; 
he will become, on the contrary, doubly vigilant, in 
quisitive, and severe. : I am a professed radical,' said 
the tenant of a great duke to a friend of mine, ' and 
the duke knows it ; but if I vote for his candidates, he 
lets me talk as I please, live with whom I please, and 
does not care if I dine at a radical dinner every day in 
the week. If there was a ballot, nothing could per- 
suade the duke, or the duke's master, the steward, that 
I was not deceiving them, and I should lose my farm 
in a week.' This is the real history of what would 
take place. The single lie on the hustings would not 
suffice ; the concealed democrat who voted against his 
landlord must talk with the wrong people, subscribe to 
the wrong club, huzza at the wrong dinner, break the 
wrong head, lead (if he wished to escape the watchful 
jealousy of his landlord) a long life of lies between 
every election ; and he must do this, not only eundo, in 
his calm and prudential state, but redeundo from the 
market, warmed with beer and expanded by alcohol ; 
and he must not only carry on his seven years of dis- 
simulation before the world, but in the very bosom of 
his family, or he must expose himself to the danger- 
ous garrulity of his wife, children, and servants, from 
whose indiscretion every kind of evil report would be 
carried to the ears of the watchful steward. And 
when once the ballot is established, mere gentle quiet 
lying will not do to hide the tenant who secretly votes 
against his landlord ; the quiet passive liar will be sus- 
pected, and he will find,il he does not wave his bonnet 
and strain his throat in furtherance of his bad faith, and 
lie loudly, that he has put in a false ball in the dark to 
very little purpose. I consider a long concealment of 
political opinion from the landlord to be nearly impos- 
sible for the tenant ; and if you conceal from the land- 
lord the only proof he can have of his tenant's sincerity, 
you are taking from the tenant the only means he has 
of living quietly upon his farm. You are increasing the 
jealousy and irascibility of the tyrant, and multiplying 
instead of lessening the number of his victims. 

Not only do you not protect the tenant who wishes to 
deceive his landlord, by promising one way and voting 
another, but you expose all the other tenants who have 
no intention of deceiving, to all the evils of mistake and 
misrepresentation. The steward hates a tenant, and a 
rival wants his farm : they begin to whisper him out 
of favour, and to propagate rumours of his disaffection 
to the blue or yellow cause ; as matters now stand he 
can refer to the poll-book, and show how he has voted. 
Under the ballot his security is gone, and he is expo- 
sed, in common with his deceitful neighbour, to that 
suspicion from which none can be exempt when all 
vote in secret. If ballot then answered the purpose 
for which it was intended, the number of honest ten- 
ants whom it exposed to danger would be as great as 
the number of deceitful tenants whom it screened. 

But if landlords could be prevented from influencing 
their tenants in voting, by threatening them with the 
loss of farms ; — if public opinion were too strong to 
allow of such threats, what would prevent a landlord 
from refusing to take as a tenant, a man whose politi- 
cal opinion did not agree with his own ? what w r ould 
prevent him from questioning long before the election, 
and cross-examining his tenant and demanding certifi. 
cates of his behaviour and opinions, till he had, ac- 
cording to all human probability, found a man who 
felt as strongly as himself upon political subjects, and 
who would adhere to those opinions with as much 
firmness and tenacity? What Avould prevent, for in- 
stance, an Orange landlord from filling his farms with 
Orange tenants, and from cautiously rejecting every 
Catholic tenant who presented himself plough in hand ? 
But if this practice were to obtain generally, of cau« 



BALLOT. 



265 



tiously selecting tenants from their political opinion, 
what would become of the sevenfold shield of the bal- 
lot ? Not only this tenant is not continued in the farm 
he already holds, but he finds from the severe inquisi- 
tion into which men of property are driven by the in- 
vention of ballot, that it is extremely difficult for a 
man whose principles are opposed to those of his land- 
lord, to get any farm at all. 

The noise and jollity of a ballot mob must be such 
as the very devils would look on with delight. A set 
of deceitful wretches, wearing the wrong colours, 
abusing their friends, pelting the man for whom they 
voted, drinking their enemies' punch, knocking down 
persons with whom they entirely agreed, and roaring 
out eternal duration to principles they abhorred. A 
scene of wholesale bacchanalian fraud, a posse comita- 
tus of liars, which would disgust any man with a free 
governmentj and make him sigh for the monocracy of 
Constantinople. 

All the arguments which apply to suspected tenants 
apply to suspected shopkeepers. Their condition un- 
der the ballot would be infinitely worse than under the 
present system ; the veracious shopkeeper would be 
suspected, perhaps without having his vote to appeal 
to for his protection, and the shopkeeper who meant to 
deceive must prop up his fraud, by accommodating his 
whole life to his first deceit, or he would have told a 
disgraceful falsehood in vain. The political persecu- 
tors would not be baffled by the ballot ; customers, 
who think they have a right to persecute tradesmen 
now, would do it then, the only difference would be 
that more would be persecuted then on suspicion, than 
are persecuted now from a full knowledge of every 
man's vote. Inquisitors would be exasperated by this 
attempt of their victims to become invisible, and the 
search for delinquents would be more sharp and in- 
cessant. 

A state of things may (to be sure) occur where the 
aristocratic part of the voters may be desirous, by 
concealing their votes, of protecting themselves from 
the fury of the multitude ; but precisely the same ob- 
jection obtains against ballot, whoever may be the 
oppressor or the oppressed. It is no defence ; the sin- 
gle falsehood at the hustings will not suffice. Hypo- 
crisy for seven years is impossible ; the multitude will 
be just as jealous of preserving the power of intimida- 
tion, as aristocrats are of preserving the power of pro- 
perty , and will in the same way redouble their vicious 
activity from the attempt at destroying their empire 
by ballot. 

Ballot could not prevent the disfranchisement of a 
great number of voters. The shopkeeper, harassed 
by men of both parties, equally consuming the articles 
in which he dealt, would seek security in not voting at 
all, and of course, the ballot could not screen the dis- 
obedient tenant whom the landlord requested to stay 
away from the poll. Mr. Grote has no box for this : 
but a remedy for securing the freedom of election, 
which has no power to prevent the voter from losing 
the exercise of his franchise altogether, can scarcely 
be considered as a remedy at all. There is a method, 
indeed, by which this might be remedied, if the great 
soul of Mr. Grote will stoop to adopt it. Why are the 
acts of concealment to be confined to putting in a ball? 
Why not. vote in domino, taking off the vizor to the 
returning officer only ! or as tenant Jenkins or tenant 
Hodge might be detected by their stature, why not 
poll in sedan chairs with the curtains closely drawn, 
choosing the chairman by ballot ? 

What a flood of deceit and villainy comes in with 
ballot ! I admit there are great moral faults under 
the present system. It is a serious violation of duty to 
vote for A. when you think B. the more worthy repre- 
sentative ; but the open voter, acting under the influ- 
ence of his landlord, commits only this one fault, great 
as it is : — if he vote for his candidate, the landlord is 
satisfied, and asks no other sacrifice of truth and opi- 
nion ; but if the tenant votes against his landlord, 
under the ballot, he is practising every day some fraud 
to conceal his first deviation from truth. The present 
method may produce a vicious act, but the ballot esta- 
blished a vi jious habit ; and then it is of some conse- 
quence that the law should not range itself o^ the side i 



of vice. In the open voting the law leaves you fairly 
to choose between the dangers of giving an honest, 
or the convenience of giving a dishonest vote ; but the 
ballot-law opens a booth and asylum for fraud, calling 
upon all men to lie by beat of drum — forbidding open 
honesty — promising impunity for the most scandalous 
deceit — and encouraging men to take no other view of 
virtue than whether it pays or does not pay ; for it 
must always be remembered and often repeated, and 
said and sung to Mr. Grote, that it is to the degraded 
liar only that the box will be useful. The man who 
performs what he promises needs no box. The man 
who refuses to do what he is asked to do despises the 
box. The liar, who says he will do what he never 
means to do, is the only man to whom the box is use- 
ful, and for whom this leaf out of the Punic pandects 
is to be inserted in our statute-book ; the other vices 
will begin to look up, and to think themselves neg- 
lected, if falsehood obtains such flattering distinction, 
and is thus defended by the solemn enactments of law. 
Old John Randolph, the American orator, was asked 
one day at a dinner-party in London, whether the 
ballot prevailed in his state of Virginia — ' I scarcely 
believe,' he said, ' we have such a fool in all Virgi- 
nia, as to mention even the vote by ballot ; and I do 
not hesitate to say that the adoption of the ballot 
would make any nation a nation of scoundrels, if it did 
not find them so.' John Randolph was right ; he felt 
that it was not necessary that a people should be false 
in order to be free ; universal hypocrisy would be the 
consequence of ballot : we would soon say on delibera- 
tion what David only asserted in his haste, that all men 
are liars. 

This exclamation of old Randolph applied to the 
method of popular elections, which I believe has al- 
ways been by open voice in Virginia ; but the assem- 
blies voted, and the judges were chosen by ballot ; 
and in the year 1830, upon a solemn review of their 
institutions, ballot was entirely abolished in every 
instance throughout the state, and open voting substi- 
tuted in its place. . 

Not only would the tenant under ballot be constantly 
exposed to the suspicions of the landlord, but the land- 
lord would be exposed to the constant suspicions and 
the unjust misrepresentations of the tenant. Every 
tenant who was dismissed for a fair and a just cause, 
would presume he was suspected, would attribute his 
dismissal to political motives, and endeavour to make 
himself a martyr with the public ; and in this way vio- 
lent hatred would be by the ballot disseminated among 
classes of men on whose agreement the order and hap- 
piness of England depend. 

All objections to ballot which are important in Eng- 
land apply with much greater force to Ireland, a 
country of intense agitation, fierce passions, and quick 
movements. Then how would the ballot-box of Mr. 
Grote harmonize with the confessional-box of Father 
O'Leary ? 

I observe Lord John Russell, and some important 
men as well as him, saying, ' We hate ballot, but if 
these practices continue, we shall be compelled to 
vote for it.' What .' vote for it, if ballot is no remedy 
of these evils? Vote for it, if ballot produces still 
greater evils than it cures ? That is, (says the physi- 
cian) if fevers increase in this alarming manner, I 
shall be compelled to make use of some medicine 
which will be of no use to fevers, and will at the same 
time bring on diseases of a much more serious nature. 
I shall be under the absolute necessity of putting out 
your eyes, because I cannot prevent you from being 
lame. In fact, this sort of language is utterly unwor- 
thy of the sense and courage of Lord John ; he gives 
hopes where he ought to create absolute despair. This 
is that hovering between two principles which ruins 
political strength by lowering political character, and 
creates a notion that his enemies need not fear such a 
man, and that his friends cannot trust him. No opi- 
nion could be more unjust as applied to Lord John ; 
but such an opinion will grow if he begins to value 
himself more upon his dexterity and finesse, than upon 
those fine, manly, historico-Russell qualities he most 
undoubtedly possesses. There are two beautiful words 
in the English language — ves and no ; he must pro- 



pro- 



WORKS OF THE REV. SIDNEY SMITH. 



nounce them boldly and emphatically ; stick to yes 
and no to the death ; for yes and no lay his head 
upon the scaffold, where his ancestors have laid their 
heads before. — and cling to his yes and no in spite of 
Robert Peel and John Wilson, and Joseph, and Daniel 
and Fergus, and Stephens himself. He must do as the 
Russells always have done, advance his firm foot on 
the field of honour — plant it on 'heline marked out by 
justice, and determine in that cause to perish or to 
prevail. 

In clubs, ballot preserves secrecy ; but in clubs, 
after the barrister has blackballed the colonel, he most 
likely never hears of the colonel again : he does not 
live among people who are calling out for seven years 
the colonel for ever ; nor is there any one who, thinking 
he has a right to the barrister's suffrage, exercises the 
most incessant vigilance to detect whether or not he 
has been defrauded of it. I do not say that ballot can 
never in any instance be a mean of secrecy and safety, 
but that it cannot be so in popular elections. Even in 
elections, a consummate hypocrite who was unmar- 
ried, and drank water, might perhaps exercise his 
timid patriotism with impunity ; but the instances 
would be so rare as to render ballot utterly inefficient 
as a general protection against the abuses of power. 

In America, ballot is nearly a dead letter ; no pro- 
tection is wanted : if the ballot protects any man, it is 
the master, not the man. Some of the states have no 
ballot, — some have exchanged the ballot for open 
voting. 

Bribery carried on in any town now would probably 
be carried on with equal success under the ballot. 
The attorney (if such a system prevailed) would say 
to the candidate, 'There is my list of promises; if 
you come in I will have 5,000Z., and if you do not, you 
shall pay me nothing.' To this list, to which I sup- 
pose all the venal rabble of the town to have put their 
names, there either is an opposition bribery-list, or 
there is not : if there is not, the promisers, looking only 
to make money by their vote, have every inducement 
to keep their word. If there is an opposition list, the 
only trick which a promiser can play is to put down 
his name upon both lists : but this trick would be so 
easily detected, so much watched and suspected, and 
would even in the vote-market render a man so infa- 
mous, that it never would be attempted to any great 
extent. At present, if a man promises his vote to A., 
and votes for B., because he can get more money by 
it, he does not become infamous among the bribed, 
btcause they lose no money by him ; but where a list 
is found, and a certain sum of money is to be divided 
among that list, every interloper lessons the receipts 
of all the rest ; it becomes their interest to guard 
against fraudulent intrusion ; and a man who puts his 
name upon more lists than the votes he was entitled 
to give, would soon be hunted down by those he had 
Kpbbed. Of course there would be no pay till after the 
election, and the man who having one vote had put 
iiinn-elf down on two lists, or having two votes had 
) ii! himself down on three lists, could hardly fail to be 
detected, and would, of course, lose his political acel- 
dama. There must be honour among thieves ; the 
mob regularly inured to bribery under the canopy of 
the ballot, would for their own sake soon introduce 
rules for the distribution of the plunder, and infuse, 
v. -ith their customary energy, the morality of not being 
sold more than once at every election. 

If ballot were established, it would be received by 
the upper classes with the greatest possible suspicion, 
and every effort would be made to counteract it and 
to get rid of it. Against those attacks the inferior 
orders would naturally wish to strengthen themselves, 
and the obvious means would be by extending the 
number of voters ; and so comes on universal suffrage. 
The ballot would fail : it would be found neither to 
prevent intimidation nor bribery. Universal suffrage 
would cure both, as a teaspoonful of prussic acid is a 
certain cure for the most formidable diseases ; but 
XBfi .jrsal suffrage would in all probability be the next 
step. ' The 200 richest voters of Bridport shah not 
beat the 400 poorest voters. Everybody who has a 
house shall vote, or everybody who is twenty-one 
shall vote, and then the people will be sure to have 



their way — we will blackball every member standing 
for Bridgewater who does not vote for universal suff- 
rage.' 

The ballot and universal suffrage are never men 
tioned by the radicals without being coupled toge- 
gether. Nobody ever thinks of separating them. 
Any person who attempted to separate them at torch 
light or sunlight meetings would be hooted down. It 
is professedly avowed that ballot is only wanted foi 
ulterior purposes, and no one makes a secret of what 
those ulterior purposes are : not only would the gift of 
ballot, if universal suffrage were refused, not be recei- 
ved with gratitude, but it would be received with furi- 
ous indgination and contempt, and universal suffrage be 
speedily extorted from you. 

There would be this argument also for universal suf- 
frage, to which I do not think it very easy to find an 
answer. The son of a man who rents a house of ten 
pounds a year is often a much cleverer man than his 
father; the wife more intelligent than the husband. 
Under the system of open voting, these persons are 
not excluded from want of intellect, but for want of 
independence, for they would necessarily vote with 
their principal ; but the moment the ballot is estab- 
lished, according to the reasoning of the Grote school, 
one man is as independent as another, because all are 
concealed, and so all are equally entitled to offer their 
suffrages. This cannot sow dissensions in families ; 
for how, ballotically reasoning, can the father find 
out ? or, if he did find out, how has any father, ballo- 
tically speaking, a right to control the votes 'of his 
family ? 

I have often drawn a picture in my own mind of a 
Balloto-Grotical family voting and promising under the 
new system. There is one vacancy, and three candi- 
dates, tory, whig, and radical. Walter Wiggins, a 
small artificer of shoes, for the moderate gratuity ox 
five pounds, promises his own vote, and that of the 
chaste Arabella his wife, to the tory candidate; he. 
Walter Wiggins, having also sold, for one sovereign, 
the vote of the before-named Arabella to the Whigs 
Mr. John Wiggins, a tailor, the male progeny of Wal- 
ter and Arabella, at the solicitation of his master, 
promises his vote to the whigs, and persuades his sister 
Honoria to make a similar promise in the same cause. 
Arabella, the wife, yields implicitly to the wishes of 
her husband. In this way, before election, stand com- 
mitted the highly moral family of Mr. Wiggins. The 
period for lying arrives, and the mendacity machine is 
exhibited to the view of the Wigginses. What hap- 
pens ? Arabella, who has in the interim been chastis- 
ed by her drunken husband, votes secretly for the rad- 
icals, having been sold both to whig and tory. Mr. 
John Wiggins, pledged beyond redemption to the 
whigs, votes for the tory; and Honoria, extrinsically 
furious in the cause of whigs, is persuaded by her lover 
to vote for the radical member. The following table 
exhibits the state of this moral family before and after 
the election. — 

Walter Wiggins sells himself once and his wife twice. 
Arabella Wiggins, sold to tory and whig, votes for radical. 
John Wiggins, promised to whig, votes for tory. 
Honoria Wiggins, promised to whig, votes for radical. 

In this way the families of the poor, under the leg- 
islation of Mr. Grote, will become schools for good 
faith, openness, and truth. What are Chrysippus and 
Crantor, and all the moralists of the whole world, 
compared to Mr. Grote ? 

It is urged that the lower order of voters, proud of 
such a distinction, will not be anxious to extend it to 
others ; but the lower order of voters will often find 
that they possess this distinction in vain — that wealth 
and education are too strong rbr them ; and they will 
call hi the multitude as auxiliaries, firmly believing 
that they can curb their inferiors and conquer their 
superiors. Ballot is a mere illusion, but universal 
suffrage is not an illusion. The common people will 
get nothing by the one, but they will gain everything, 
and ruin every thing, by the last. 

Some members of Parliament who rnean to vote for 
ballot, in the fear of losing their seats, and who are 
desirous of reconciling to their conscience such an act 



FIRST LETTER TO ARCHDEACON SINGLETON. 



267 



of disloyalty to mankind, are fond of saying that bal- 
lot is harmless ; that it will neither do the good nor the 
evil that is expected from it ; and that the people may 
fairly be indulged in such an innocent piece of legisla- 
tion. Never was such folly and madness as this ; bal- 
lot will be the cause of interminable hatred and jea- 
lousy among the different orders of mankind ; it will 
familiarize the English people to a long tenour of de- 
ceit; it will not answer its purpose of protecting the 
independent voter, and the people, exasperated and 
disappointed by the failure, will indemnify themselves 
by insisting upon unlimited suffrage. And then it is 
talked of as an experiment, as if men were talking of 
acids and alkalies, and the galvanic pile ; as if Lord 
John could get on the hustings and say, ' Gentlemen, 
you see this ballot does not answer ; do me the favour 
to give it up, and to allow yourselves to be re- 
placed in the same situation as the ballot found you.' 
Such, no doubt, is the history of nations and the march 
of human affairs ; and, in this way, the error of a sud- 
den and foolish largess of power to the people might, 
no doubt, be easily retrieved. The most unpleasant 
of all bodily feelings is a cold sweat ; nothing brings 
it on so surely as perilous nonsense in politics. I lose 
all warmth from the bodily frame when I hear the bal- 
lot talked of as an experiment. 

I cannot at all understand what is meant by this in- 
dolent opinion. Votes are coerced now ; if votes are 
free, will the elected be the same? if not, will the 
difference of the elected be unimportant ? Will not the 
ballot stimulate the upper orders to fresh exertions ? — 
and are their increased jealousy and interference of no 
importance ? If ballot, after all, is found to hold out 
a real protection to the voter, is universal lying of no 
importance ? I can understand what is meant by call- 
ing ballot a great good, or a great evil; but, in the 
mighty contention for power which is raging in this 
country, to call it indifferent appears to me extremely 
foolish in all those in whom it is not extremely dis- 
honest. 

If the ballot did succeed in enabling the lower order 
of voters to conquer their betters, so much the worse. 
In a town consisting of 700 voters, the 300 most opu- 
lent and powerful (and therefore probably the best in- 
structed) would make a much better choice than the 
remaining 400 ; and the ballot would, in that case, do 
more harm than good. In nineteen cases out of twen- 
ty, the most numerous party would be in the wrong. 
If this is the case, why give the franchize to all ? why 
not confine it to the first division? because even with all 
the abuses which occur, and in spite of them, the great 
mass of the people are much more satisfied with having a 
vote occasionally controlled than with having none. — 
Many agree with their superiors, and therefore feel no 
control. Many are persuaded by their superiors, and 
not controlled. Some are indifferent which way they 
exercise the power, though they would not like to be 
utterly deprived of it. Some guzzle away their vote, 
some sell it, some brave their superiors, a few are 
threatened and controlled. The election, in different 
ways, is affected by the superior influence of the up- 
per orders ; and the great mass (occasionally and just- 
ly complaining) are, beyond all doubt, better pleased 
than if they had no votes at all. The lower orders 
always have it in their power to rebel against their 
superiors ; and occasionally they will do so, and have 
done so, and occasionally and justly carried elections* 
against gold, and birth, and education. But it is mad- 
ness to make laws of society which attempt to shake 
off the great laws of nature. As long as men love 
bread, and mutton, and broadcloth, wealth, in a long 
series of years, must have enormous effects upon hu- 
man affairs, and the strong box will beat the ballot 
box. Mr. Grote has both, but he miscalculates their 
respective powers. Mr. Grote knows the relative values 
of gold and silver ; but by what moral rate of exchange 
is he able to teD us the relative values of liberty and 
truth ? 

It is hardly necessary to say any thing about univer- 

* The 400 or 500 voting against the 200, are right about as 
often as juries are right in differing from judges ; and that 
is very seldom. 



sal suffrage, as there is no act of folly or madnest 
which it may not in the beginning produce. Thera 
would be the greatest risk that the monarchy, as at 
present constituted, the funded debt, the established 
church, titles, and hereditary peerage, would give way 
before it. Many really honest men may wish for these 
changes ; I know, or at least believe, that wheat and 
barley would grow if there was no Archbishop of Can- 
terbury, and domestic fowls would breed if our Vis- 
count Melbourne was again called Mr. Lamb ; but they 
have stronger nerves than I have who would venture 
to bring these changes about. So few nations have 
been free, it is so difficult to guard freedom from 
kings, and mobs, and patriotic gentlemen ; and we are 
in such a very tolerable state of happiness in England, 
that I think such changes would be very rash ; and I 
have an utter mistrust in the sagacity and penetration 
of political reasoners who pretend to foresee all the 
consequences to which they would give birth. When 
I speak of the tolerable state of happiness in which 
we live in England, I do not speak merely of no- 
bles, squires, and canons of St. Pauls, but of drivers 
of coaches, clerks in offices, carpenters, blacksmiths, 
butchers, and bakers, and most men who do not marry 
upon nothing, and become burdened with large fami- 
lies before they arrive at years of maturity. The 
earth is not sufficiently fertile for this : 

Difficilem victum fundit durissima tellus. 

After all, the great art in politics and war is to 
choose a good position for making a stand. The Duke 
of Wellington examined and fortified the lines of Tor- 
res Vedras a year before he had any occasion to make 
use of them, and he had previously marked out Wa- 
terloo as the probable scene of some future exploit. — 
The people seem to be hurrying on through all the 
well-known steps to anarchy ; they must be stopped 
at some pass or another ; the first is the best and most 
easily defended. The people have a right to ballot or 
to any thing else which will make them happy ; and 
they have a right to nothing which will make them 
unhappy. They are the best judges of their immedi- 
ate gratifications, and the worst judges of what would 
best conduce to their interests for a series of years. — 
Most earnestly and conscientiously wishing their good, 
I say, 

No Ballot. 



FIRST LETTER TO ARCHDEACON SINGLETON 

ON THE ECCLESIASTICAL COMMISSION. 
My Dear Sir, — 

As you do me the honour to ask my opinion respect- 
ing the constitution and proceedings of the ecclesias- 
tical commission, and of their conduct to the dignita- 
ries of the church, I shall write to you without any re- 
serve upon this subject. 

The first thing which excited my surprise, was the 
constitution of the commission. As the reform was 
to comprehend every branch of churchmen, bishops, 
dignitaries, and parochial clergymen, I cannot but 
think it would have been much more advisable to have 
added to the commission some members of the two 
lower orders of the church — they would have supplied 
that partial knowledge which appears in so many of 
the proceedings of the commissioners to have been 
wanting — they would have attended to those interests 
(not episcopal) which appear to have been so complete- 
ly overlooked — and they would have screened the com- 
mission from those charges of injustice and partiality 
which are now so generally brought against it. There 
can be no charm in the name of bishop — the man who 
was a curate yesterday is a bishop to-day. There are 
many prebendaries, many rectors, and many vicars, 
who would have come to the reform of the church 
with as much integrity, wisdom, and vigour as any 
bishop on the bench ; and I believe, with a much stron- 
ger recollection that all the orders of the church were 
not to be sacrificed to the highest ; and that to make 
their work respectable, and lasting, it should in all 
(even in its minutest provisions), be founded upon jus- 
tice. 



268 



WORKS OF THE REV. SIDNEY SMITH. 



AL the interests of the church in the commutation 
of tithes are entrusted to one. parochial clergyman ;* 
and I have no doubt, from what I hear of him, that 
they will be well protected. Why could not one or 
two such men have been added to the commission, and 
a general impression been created, that government in 
this momentous change had a parental feeling for all 
orders of men whose interests might be affected by it ? 
A ministry may laugh at this, and think if they culti- 
vate bishops, that they may treat the other orders of 
the church with contempt and neglect ; but I say, that 
to create a general impression of justice, if it be not 
what common honesty requires from any ministry, is 
what common sense points out to them. It is strength 
and duration — it is the only power which is worth hav- 
ing — in the struggle of parties it gives victory, and is 
remembered, and goes down to other times. ^ 

A mixture of different orders of clergy in' the com- 
mission would at least have secured a decent attention 
to the representations of all ; for of seven communica- 
tions made to the commission by cathedrals, and in- 
volving very serious representations respecting high 
interests, six were totally disregarded, and the receipt 
of the papers not even acknowledged. 

I cannot help thinking that the commissioners have 
done a great deal too much. Reform of the church 
was absolutely necessary — it cannot be avoided, and 
ought not to be postponed ; but I would have found 
out what really gave offence, have applied a remedy, 
removed the nuisance, and done no more. I would not 
have operated so largely on an old, and (I fear) a de- 
caying building. I would not, in days of such strong 
political excitement, and amidst such a disposition to 
universal change, have done one thing more than was 
absolutely necessary to remove the odium against the 
establishment, the only sensible reason for issuing any 
commission at all ; and the means which I took to 
effect this, should have agreed as much as possible 
with institutions already established. For instance, 
the public were disgusted with the spectacle of rich 
prebendaries enjoying large incomes, and doing little 
or nothing for them. The real remedy for this would 
have been to have combined wealth and labour ; and 
as each of the present prebendaries fell off, to have 
annexed the stall to some large and populous parish. 
A prebendary of Canterbury or of St. Paul's, in his 
present state, may make the church unpopular ; but 
place him as rector of a parish, with 8000 or 9000 peo- 
ple, and in a benefice of little or no value, he works 
for his wealth, and the odium is removed. In like 
manner the prebends, which are not the property of 
the residentiaries, might have been annexed to the 
smallest livings of the neighbourhood where the pre- 
bendal estate was situated. - The interval which has 
elapsed since the first furious demand for reform, 
would have enabled the commissioners to adopt a 
scheme of much greater moderation than might per- 
haps have been possible at the first outbreak of popu- 
lar indignation against the church ; and this sort of 
distribution would have given much more general sat- 
isfaction than the plan adopted by commissioners ; for 
though money, in the estimation of philosophers, has 
no ear mark, it has a very deep one in the opinion of 
the multitude. The riches of the church of Durham 
were most hated in the neighbourhood of Durham ; 
and there such changes as I have pointed out would 
have been most gladly received, and would have con- 
ciliated the greatest favour to the church. The peo- 
ple of Kent cannot see why their Kentish estates, giv- 
en to the cathedral of Canterbury, are to augment 
livings in Cornwall. The citizens of London see some 
of their ministers starving in the city, and the profits 
of the extinguished prebends sent into Northumber- 
land. These feelings may be very unphilosophical, 
but they are the feelings of the mass ; and to the feel- 
ings of the mass the reforms of the church ought to be 
directed. In this way the evil would have been cor- 
rected where it was most seen and noticed. All pat- 
ronage would have been left as it was. One order of 
the church would not have plundered the other. Nor 

* The Rev. Mr. Jones is the commissioner appointed by 
the Archbishop of Canterbury, to watch over the interests 
of the church. 



would all the cathedrals in England hav,ebeen subject- 
ed to the unconciliating empire, and uuveaned energy 
of one man. 

Instead of this quiet and cautious mode of proceed- 
ing, all is change, fusion and confusion. New bishops, 
new dioceses, confiscated prebends— clergymen chang- 
ing bishops, and bishops clergymen — mitres in Man- 
chester, Gloucester turned into Bristol. Such a scene 
of revolution and commutation as has not been seen 
.since the days of Ireton and Cromwell ! and the sin- 
gularity is, that all this has been effected by men se- 
lected from their age, their dignity, and their known 
principles, and from whom the considerate part of the 
community expected all the the caution and calmness 
which these high requisites seemed to promise, and 
ought to have secured. 

The plea of making a fund is utterly untenable— the 
great object was not to make a fund ; and there is the 
mistake into which the commission have fallen : the 
object was not to add 10/. or 20/. per annum to a thous- 
and small livings, and to diminish inequalities in a 
ratio so trifling that the public will hardly notice it ; 
a very proper ihing to do if higher interests were not 
sacrificed to it, but the great object was to remove the 
causes of hatred from the church, by lessening such 
incomes as those of Canterbury, Durham, and London, 
exorbitantly and absurdly great— by making idleness 
work — and by these means to lessen the envy of lay- 
men. It is imposssible to make a fund which will 
raise the smaller livings of the church into any thing 
like a decent support for those who possess them 
The whole income of the church, episcopal, prebendal, 
and parochial, divided among the clergy, would not 
give to each clergyman an income equal to that which 
is enjoyed by the upper domestic of a great nobleman. 
The method in which the church has been paid, and 
must continue to be paid, is by unequal divisions. All 
the enormous changes which the commission is making 
will produce a very trifling difference in the inequality, 
while it will accustom more and more those enemies 
of the church, who are studying under their right rev. 
masters, to the boldest revolutions in ecclesiastical af- 
fairs. Out of 10,478 benefices, there are 297 of about 
40/. per annum value, 1,629 at about 75/., and 1,602 at 
about 125/. ; to raise all these benefices to 200/. per 
annum, would require an annual sum of 371,293/. ; and 
upon 2,878 of those benefices there are no houses ; and 
upon 1,728 no houses fit for residence. What differ- 
ence in the apparent inequality of the church would 
this sum of 371 ,293/. produce, if it could be raised ? or 
in what degree would it lessen the odium which thai, 
inequality creates ? The case is utterly hopeless ; and 
yet with all their confiscations the commissioners are 
so far from being able to raise the annual sum of 
371,000/., that the utmost they expect to gain is 130,- 
000/. per annum. 

It seems a paradoxical statement, but the fact is, 
that the respectability of the church, as well as of the 
bar, is almost entirely preserved by the unequal divi- 
sion of their revenues. A bar of one hundred lawyers 
travel the northern circuit, enlightening provincial ig- 
norance, curing local partialities, diffusing knowledge, 
and dispensing justice in their route : it is quite certain 
that all they gain is not equal to all that they spend ; 
if the profits were equally divided, there would not be 
six and eight-pence for each person, and there would 
be no bar at all. At present, the success of the leadei 
animates them all — each man hopes to be a Scarlett oi 
a Brougham— and takes out his ticket in a lottery bv 
which the mass must infallibly lose, trusting (as man- 
kind are so apt to do) to his good fortune, and believ- 
ing that the prize is reserved for him, disappointment 
and defeat for others. So it is with the clergy ; the 
whole income of the church, if equally divided, would 
be about 250/. for each minister. Who would go into 
the church and spend 1,200/. or 1,500/. upon his educa- 
tion, if such were the highest remuneration he could 
ever look to ? At present, men are tempted into the 
church by the prizes of the church, aud bring into that 
church a great deal of capital, which enables them to 
live in decency, supporting themselves, not with the 
money of the public, but with their own money, which, 
but for this temptation, would have been carried into 



*TRS1 LETTER TO ARCHDEACON SINGLETON. 



some retail trade. The offices of the church would 
then fall down to men little less coarse and ignorant 
than agricultural labourers — the clergyman of the par- 
ish would soon be seen in the squire's kitchen • and all 
this would take place in a country where poverty is 
infamous. 

In fact, nothing can be more unjust and idle than the 
reasoning of many laymen upon church matters. You 
choose to have an establishment — God forbid you 
uhould choose otherwise ! and you wish to have men 
of decent manners, and good education, as the minis- 
ters of that establishment ; all this is very right : but 
are you willing to pay them as such men ought to be 
paid ? Are you willing to pay to each clergyman, con- 
rining himself to one spot, and giving up all his time to 
the care of one parish, a salary of 500Z. per annum? 
To do this would require three millions to be added to 
the present revenues of the church ; and such an ex- 
penditure is impossible ! What then remains, if you 
will have a clergy and will not pay them equitably and 
separately, than to pay them unequally and by lotte- 
ry ? and yet this very inequality, which secures to you 
a respectable clergy upon the most economical terms, 
is considered by laymen as a gross abuse. It is an 
abuse, however, which they have not the spirit to ex- 
tinguish by increased munificence to their clergy, not 
justice to consider as the only other method by which 
all the advantages of a respectable establishment can 
be procured ; but they use it at the same time as a to- 
pic for sarcasm, and a source of economy. 

This, it will be said, is a mammonish view of the 
subject; it is so, but those who make this objection, 
forget the immense effect which mammon produces 
upon religion itself. Shall the Gospel be preached by 
men paid by the state ? shall these men be taken from 
the lower orders and be meanly paid? shall they be 
men of learning and education? and shall there be 
some magnificent endowments to allure such men into 
the church ? Which of these methods is the best for 
diffusing the rational doctrines of Christianity ? not in 
the age of the apostles, not in the abstract, timeless, 
nameless, placeless land of the philosophers, but in 
the year 1837, in the porter-brewing, cotton-spinning, 
tallow-melting kingdom of Great Britain, bursting 
with opulence, and flying from poverty as the great- 
est of human evils. Many different answers may be 
given to these questions, but they are questions which, 
not ending in mammon, have a powerful bearing on 
real religion, and deserve the deepest consideration 
from its disciples and friends. Let the comforts of 
the clergy go for nothing. Consider their state only 
as religion is affected by it. If upon this principle 
I am forced to allot to some an opulence which my 
clever friend the Examiner would pronounce to be 
apostolical, I cannot help it ; I must take this people 
with all their follies, and prejudices, and circumstan- 
ces, and carve out an establishment best suited for 
them, however unfit for early Christianity in barren 
and conquered Judea. 

Not only will this measure of the commission bring 
into the church a lower and worse educated set of 
men, but it will have a tendency to make the clergy 
fanatical. You will have a set of ranting, raving pas- 
tors, who will wage war against all the innocent plea- 
sures of life, vie with each other in extravagance of 
zeal, and plague your heart out with their nonsense 
and absurdity : cribbage must be played in caverns, 
and sixpenny whist take refuge in the wilderness. In 
this way low men doomed to hopeless poverty, and 
galled by contempt, will endeavour to force them- 
selves into station and significance. 

There is an awkward passage in the memorial of 
the church of Canterbury, which deserves some consi- 
deration from him to whom it is directed. The Arch- 
bishop of Canterbury, at his consecration, takes a so- 
lemn oath that he will maintain the rights and liber- 
ties of the church of Canterbury ; as chairman, how- 
ever, of the new commissiou, he seizes the patronage 
of that church, takes two-thirds of its revenues, and 
abolishes two-thirds of its members. That there is 
an answer to this I am willing to believe, but I cannot 
at present find out what it is ; and this attack upon 
the revenues and members of Canterbury, is not obe- 



dience to an act of Parliament, but the very act of 
Parliament, which takes away, is recommended, 
drawn up, and signed by the person who has sworn 
he will never take away ; and this little apparent in- 
consistency is not confined to the Archbishop of Can- 
terbury, but is shared equally by all the bishop com- 
missioners, who have all, (unless I am grievously 
mistaken), taken similar oaths for the preservation of 
their respective chapters. It would be more easy to 
see our way out of this little embarrassment, if soma 
of the embarrassed had not, unfortunately, in the par- 
liamentary debates on the Catholic question, laid the 
greatest stress upon the king's oath, applauded the 
sanctity of the monarch to the skies, rejected all 
comments, called for the oath in its plain meaning, 
and attributed the safety of the English church to the 
solemn vow made by the king at the altar to the 
Archbishops of Canterbury and York, and the other 
bishops. I should be very sorry if this were not 
placed on a clear footing, as fools will be imputing 
to 1 our church the pia et religiosa Calliditas, which 
is so commonly brought against the Catholics. 

Urbem quam dicunt Romam, Meliboee, putavi 
Stultus ego huic nostra similem. 

The words of Henry VIII., in endowing the cathe- 
dral of Canterbury, are thus given in the translation. 
' We, therefore, dedicating the aforesaid close, site, 
circle, and precinct to the honour and glory of the 
Holy and undivided Trinity, Father, Son, and Holy 
Spirit, have decreed that a certain Cathedral and Me- 
tropolitan Church, with one Dean, Presbyter, and 
twelve Prebendaries Presbyters ; these verily and for 
ever to serve Almighty God shall be created, set up, 
settled, and established ; and the same aforesaid Ca- 
thedral and Metropolitan Church, with one Dean, 
Presbyter, and twelve Prebendaries Presbyters, with 
other Ministers necessary for divine worship, by the 
tenour of these present's in reality, and plentitude of 
force, we do create, set up, settle, and establish, and 
do command to be established and to be in perpetuity, 
and inviolably maintained and upheld by these pre- 
sents.' And this is the church, the rights and liber- 
ties of which the archbishop at his consecration 
swears to maintain. Nothing can be more ill-natured 
among politicians, than to look back into Hansard's 
Debates, to see what has been said by particular men 
upon particular occasions, and to contrast such speech- 
es with present opinions — and therefore I forbear to 
introduce some inviting passages upon taking oaths in 
their plain and obvious sense, both in debates on the 
Catholic question and upon that fatal and Mezentian 
oath which binds the Irish to the English church. 

It is quite absurd to see how all the cathedrals are 
to be trimmed to an exact Procrustes pattern ; — quieta 
movere is the motto of the commission : — there is to 
be everywhere a dean, and four residentiaries ; but 
St. Paul's and Lincoln have at present only three 
residentiaries, and a dean, who officiates in his turn 
as a canon : — a fourth must be added to each. Why ? 
nobody wants prebendaries ; St. Paul's and Lincoln go 
on very well as they are. It is not for the lack of , / 
prebendaries, it is for idleness, that the Church of ^ 
England is unpopular ; but in the lust of reforming, 
the commission cut and patch property as they would 
cut figures in pasteboard. This little piece of wanton 
change, however, gives to two of the bishops, who are 
commissioners as well as bishops, patronage of a 
thousand a year each ; and though I am willing to 
consider this as the cause of the recommendation, 
yet I must observe it is not very common that the 
same persons should bring in the verdict and receive 
the profits of the suit. No other archdeacons are paid 
in such a manner, and no other bishops out of the 
commission have received such a bonus.* 

I must express my surprise that nothing in this 
commission of bishops, either in the bill which has 
passed, or in the report which preceded it, is said of 



* This extravagant pay of archdeacons is taken, remem • 
ber, from that fund for the augmentation of small livings 
for the establishment of which all the divisions and confia 
cations have been made. 



270 



WORKS OF THE REV. SIDNEY SMITH. 



the duties of bishops. A bishop is now forced by law 
to be in his diocese or to attend his duty in Parliament 
— he may be entirely absent from both ; nor are there 
wanting instances within these six years where such 
has been the case. It would have been very easy 
to have placed the repairs of episcopal palaces 
(as the concurrent leases of bishops are placed) 
under the superintendence of deans and chapters; 
but though the bishops' bill was accompanied by 
another bill, containing the strictest enactments for 
the residence of the clergy, and some very arbitra- 
ry and unjust rules for the repair of their houses, it 
did not appear upon the face of the law that the bish- 
ops had any such duties to perform ; and yet I remem- 
ber the case of a bishop, dead not six years ago, who 
was scarcely ever seen in the House of Lords, or in 
his diocese ; and I remember well also the indigna- 
tion with which the inhabitants of the great cathe- 
dral town spoke of the conduct of another bishop 
(now also deceased) who not only never entered his 
palace, but turned his horses into the garden. When 
I mention these instances, I am not setting myself 
up as the satirist of bishops. I think, upon the whole, 
they do their duty in a very exemplary manner, but 
they are not, as the late bills would have us to sup- 
pose, impeccable. The church commissioners should 
not have suffered their reports and recommendations 
to paint the other branches of the church as such slip- 
pery transgredient mortals, and to leave the world to 
imagine that bishops may be safely trusted to their 
own goodness without enactment or control. 

This squabble about patronage is said to be dis- 
graceful. Those who mean to be idle, and insolent, 
because they are at peace, may look out of the win- 
dow and say, ' This is a disgraceful squabble between 
bishops and chapters ;' but those who mean to be 
just, should ask, Who begins ? the real disgrace of the 
squabble is in the attack, and not in the defence. If 
any man puts his hand into my pocket to take my 
property, am I disgraced if I prevent him ? Church- 
men are ready enough to be submissive to their supe- 
riors ; but were they to submit to a spoliation so 
gross, accompanied with ignominy and degradation, 
and to bear all this in submissive silence ; — to be ac- 
cused of nepotism by nepotists, who were praising 
themselves indirectly by the accusation, and benefit- 
ing themselves directly by the confiscation founded 
on it ; — the real disgrace would have been to have 
submitted to this : and men are to be honoured, not 
disgraced, who come forth contrary to their usual 
habits, to oppose those masters whom, in common 
seasons, they would willingly obey ; but who, in this 
matter, have tarnished their dignity, and forgotten 
what they owe to themselves and to us. 

It is a very singular thing that the law always sus- 
pects judges, and never suspects bishops. If there is 
any way in which the partialities of the judge may in- 
jure laymen, the subject is fenced round with all sorts 
of jealousies, and enactments, and prohibitions — all 
partialities are guarded against, and all propensities 
watched. Where bishops are concerned, acts of Par- 
liament are drawn up for beings who can never possi- 
bly be polluted by pride, prejudice, passion, or inter- 
est. Not otherwise would be the case with judges, if 
they, like the heads of the church, legislated for them- 
selves. 

Then comes the question of patronage ; can any 
thing be more flagrantly unjust, than that the patro- 
nage of cathedrals should be taken away and conferred 
upon the bishops ? I do not want to go into a long 
and tiresome history of episcopal nepotism, but it is 
notorious to all, that bishops confer their patronage 
upon their sons, and sons-in-law ; and all their relations ; 
and it is really quite monstrous in the face of the world, 
who see this every day, and every hour, to turn round 
upon deans and chapters and to say to them : ' We are 
credibly informed, that there are instances in your 
chapters where preferment has not been given to the 
most learned men you can find, but to the sons and 
brothers of some of the prebendaries. These things 
must not be — we must take these benefices into our 
own keeeping;' and this is the language of men 
swarming themselves with sons and daughters, and 



who, in enumerating the advantages of their stations, 
have always spoken of the opportunities of providing 
for their families as the greatest and most important. 
It is, I admit, the duty of every man, and of every 
body, to present the best man that can be found to 
any living of which he is the patron ; but if this duty 
has been neglected, it has been neglected by bishops 
quite as much as by chapters ; and no man can open 
the ' Clerical Guide' and read two pages of it, with- 
out seeing that the bench of bishops are the last per- 
sons from whom any remedy of this evil is to be ex- 
pected. 

The legislature has not always taken the same view 
of the trust-worthiness of bishops and chapters as is 
taken by the commission. Bishops' leases for years 
are for twenty-one years, renewable every seven. 
When seven years are expired, if the present tenant 
will not renew, the bishop may grant a concurrent 
lease. How does his lordship act on such occasions? 
He generally asks two years' income for the renewal, 
when chapters, not having the privilege of granting 
such concurring leases, ask only a year and a half; 
and if the bishop's price is not given, he puts a son, or 
a daughter, or a trustee, into the estate, and the 
price of the lease deferred is money saved for his 
family. But unfair and exorbitant terms may be ask- 
ed by his lordship, and the tenant may be unfairly 
dispossessed — therefore, the legislature enacts that all 
those concurrent leases must be countersigned by the 
dean and chapter of the diocese, making them the 
safeguards against episcopal rapacity ; and, as I hear 
from others, not making them so in vain. These sorts 
of laws do not exactly correspond with the relative 
views taken of both parties by the ecclesiastical com- 
mission. This view of chapters is of course overlook- 
ed by a commission of bishops, just as all mention of 
bridles would be omitted in a meeting of horses ; but 
in this view, chapters might be made eminently use- 
ful. In what profession, too, are there no gradations ? 
Why is the Church of England to be nothing but a col- 
lection of beggars and bishops — the Right Reverend 
Dives in the palace, and Lazarus in orders at the gate, 
doctored by dogs, and comforted with crumbs l . 

But to take away the patronage of existing preben- 
daries is objectionable for another class of reasons. 
If it is right to take away the patronage of my cathe- 
dral and to give it to the bishop, it is at least unjust 
to do so with my share of it during my life. Society 
have a right to improve, or to do what they think an 
improvement, but then they have no right to do so 
suddenly, and hastily to my prejudice ! After securing 
to me certain possessions by one hundred statutes 
passed in six hundred years — after having clothed me 
in fine garments, and conferred upon me pompous 
names, they have no right to turn round upon me all 
of a sudden and to say, You are not a dean nor a 
canon-residentiary, but a vagabond and an outcast, 
and a morbid excrecsence upon society. This would 
not be a reform, but the grossest tyranny and oppres- 
sion. If a man cannot live under the canopy of ancient 
law, where he is safe, how can he see his way, or lay 
out his plan of life ? 

i Dubitant homines serere atque impendere curas.' u 

You tolerated, for a century, the wicked traffic in 
slaves, legislated for that species of property, en- 
couraged it by premiums, defended it in your courts of 
justice — West Indians bought and sold, trusting (as 
Englishmen always ought to trust) in parliaments. 
Women went to the altar— promised that they should 
be supported by that property, and children were bom 
to it, and young men were educated with it , but God 
touched the hearts of the English people, and they 
would have no slaves. The scales fell from their eyes, , 
and they saw the monstrous wickedness of the traffic ; 
but then they said, and said magnificently, to the 
West Indians, < We mean to become wiser and better, 
but not at your expense ; the loss shall be ours, and I 
we will not involve you in ruin, because we are 
ashamed of our former cruelties, and have learnt a 
better lesson of humanity and wisdom.' And this is 
the way in which improving nations ought to act, and ' 
this is the distinction between reform and revolution. 



FIRST LETTER TO ARCHDEACON SINGLETON. 



273 



Justice is not changed by the magnitude or minute- 
ness of the subject. The old cathedrals have enjoyed 
their patronage for seven hundred years, and the new 
ones since the time of Henry VIII.; which latter pe- 
riod even gives a much longer possession than ninety- 
nine out of a hundredof the legislators, who are called 
upon to plunder us, can boast for their own estates. 
And those rights, thus sanctioned, and hallowed by 
time, are torn from their present possessors without 
the least warning, or preparation, in the midst of all 
that feverof change which has seized upon the people, 
and which frightens men to the core of their hearts ; 
and this spoliation is made, not by low men rushing 
into the plunder of the church and state, but by men 
of admirable and unimpeached character in all the re- 
lations of life — not by rash men of new politics, but 
by the ancient conservators of ancient law — by the 
archbishops and bishops of the land, high official men, 
invented and created, and put in palaces to curb the 
lawless changes, and the mutations, and the madness 
of mankind ; and to crown the whole, the ludicrous is 
added to the unjust, and what they take from the 
other branches of the church they confer upon them- 
selves. 

Never dreaming of such sudden revolutions as these, 
a prebendary brings up his son to the church, and 
spends a large sum of money in his education, which, 
perhaps, he can ill afford. His hope is (wicked 
wretch !) that, according to the established custom of 
the body to which he (immoral man!) belongs, the 
chapter will (when his turn arrives), if his son be of 
fair attainments and good character, attend to his ne- 
farious recommendation, and confer the living upon 
the young man ; and in an instant all his hopes are 
destroyed, and he finds his preferment seized upon, 
under the plea of public good, by a stronger church- 
man than himself. I can call this by no other name 
than that of tyranny and oppression. I know very 
well that this is not the theory of patronage ; but who 
does better ? do individual patrons ? do colleges who 
give in succession ? and as for bishops, lives there the 
man so weak and foolish, so little observant of the 
past, as to believe (when this tempest of purity and 
perfection has blown over) that the name of Bloom- 
field will not figure in those benefices from which the 
names of Copleston, Blomberg, Taite, and Smith, have 
been so virtuously excluded ? I have no desire to 
make odious comparisons between the purity of one 
set of patrons and another, but they are forced upon 
me by the injustice of the commissioners. I must 
either make such comparisons or yield up, without re- 
monstrance, those rights to which I am fairly entitled. 
It may be said that the bishops will do better in 
future ; that now the public eye is upon them, they will 
be* shamed into a more lofty and anti-nepotic spirit ; 
but, if the argument of past superiority is given up, 
and the hope of future amendment resorted to, why 
may we not improve as well as our masters ? but the 
commission says, ' These excellent men (meaning 
themselves) have promised to do better, and we have 
an implicit confidence in their word : we must have 
the patronage of the cathedrals. In the mean time 
we are ready to promise as well as the bishops. 

With regard to that common newspaper phrase the 
public eye, there's nothing (as the bench well know) 
more wandering and shppery than the public eye. In 
five years hence, the public eye will no more see what 
description of men are promoted by bishops, than it 
will see what doctors of law are promoted by the 
Turkish Uhlema ; and at the end of this period, (such 
is the example set by the commission,) the public eye. 
turned in every direction, may not be able to see any 
bishops at all. 

In many instances, chapters are better patrons than 
bishops, because their preferment is not given exclu- 
sively to one species of incumbents. I have a diocese 
now in my private eye which has undergone the fol- 
lowing changes. The first of three bishops whom I 
remember was a man of careless easy temper, and 
how patronage went in those early days may be con- 
jectured by the following letters — which are not his, 
but serve to illustrate a system : 



THE BISHOP TO LORD A 

My Dear Lord, 

1 I have noticed with great pleasure the behaviour of your 
lordship's second son, and am most happy to have it in my 
power to oft'er to him the living of * * *. He will find it 
of considerable value ; and there is, I understand, a very 
good house upon it, &c. &c. 

This is to confer a living upon a man of real merit 
out ,oi the family ; into which family, apparently sa- 
crificed to the public good, the living is brought back 
by the second letter : — 

TO THE SAME A YEAR AFTER. 

My dear Lord, 

Will yor excuse the liberty I take in soliciting promotion 
for my grandson ? He is an officer of great skill and gal- 
lantry, and can bring the most ample testimonials from 
some of the best men in the profession : the Arethusa frigate 
is, I understand, about to be commissioned; and if, &c. &c. 

Now I am not saying that hundreds of preben- 
diaries have not committed such enormities and stu- 
pendous crimes as this (a declaration which will fill 
the whig cabinet with horror) ; all that I mean to 
contend for is, that such is the practice of bishops 
quite as much as it is of inferior patrons. 

The second bishop was a decided enemy of Calvin- 
istical doctrines, and no clergyman so tainted had the 
slightest chance of preferment in his diocese. 

The third bishop could endure no man whose prin- 
ciples were not strictly Calvinistic, and who did not 
give to the articles that kind of interpretation. Now 
here were a great mass of clergy naturally alive to 
the emoluments of their profession, and not knowing 
which way to look or stir, because they depended so 
entirely upon the will of one person. Not otherwise 
is it with a very whig bishop, or a very tory bishop ; 
but the worst case is that of a superannuated bishop ; 
here the preferment is given away, and must be given 
away by wives and daughters, or by sons, or by but- 
lers, perhaps, and valets, and the poor dying patron's 
paralytic hand is guided to the signatures of papers, 
the contents of which he is utterly unable to compre- 
hend. In all such cases as these, the superiority of 
bishops as patrons will not assist that violence which 
the commissioners have committed upon the patronage 
of cathedrals. 

I never heard that cathedrals had sold the patronage 
of their preferment ; such a practice, however, is not 
quite unknown among the higher orders of the church. 
When the Archbishop of Canterbury consecrates an 
inferior bishop, he marks some piece of preferment in 
the gift of the bishop as his own. This is denomi- 
nated an option • and when the preferment falls, it is 
not only in the gift of the archbishop, if he is alive, 
but in the gift of his representative if he is not. It is 
an absolute chattel, which, like any other chattel, is 
part of the archbishop's assets ; and if he died in debt, 
might be taken and sold for the benefit of his credi- 
tors — and within the memory of man such options 
have been publicly sold by auction — and if the present 
Archbishop of Canterbury were to die in debt to-mor- 
row, such might be the fate of his options. What 
Archhishop Moore did with his options I do not know, 
but the late Archbishop Sutton very handsomely and 
properly left them to the present — a bequest, however, 
which would not have prevented such options from 
coming to the hammer, if Archbishop Sutton had not 
cleared off, before his death, those incumbrances 
which, at one period of his life, sat so heavily upon 
him. 

What the present archbishop means to do with 
them, I am not informed. They are not alluded to in 
the church returns, though they must be worth some 
thousand pounds. The commissioners do not seem to 
know of their existence — at least they are profoundly 
6ilent on the subject ; and the bill which passed 
through Parliament in the summer for the regulation 
of the emoluments of bishops, does not make the most 
distant allusion to them. When a parallel was drawn 
between two species of patrons — which ended in the 
confiscation of the patronage of cathedrals — when two 
archbishops helped to draw the parallel, and profited 



272 



WORKS OF THE REV. SIDNEY SMITH. 



by the parallel, I have a perfect right to state this 
corrupt and unabolished practice of their own sees — a 
practice which I never heard charged against deans 
and chapters.* 

I do not mean to imply, in the most remote degree, 
that either of the present archbishops have sold their 
options, or ever thought of it. Purer and more high- 
minded gentlemen do not exist, nor men more utterly 
incapable of doing any thing unworthy of their high 
station ; and I am convinced the Archbishop of Can- 
terbury! will imitate or exceed the munificence of his 
predecessor : but when twenty-four public bodies are 
to be despoiled of their patronage, we must look not 
only to present men, but historically, to see how it 
has been administered in times of old, and in times 
also recently past ; and to remember, that at this mo- 
ment, when bishops are set up as the most admirable 
dispensers of patronage — as the only persons fit to be 
intrusted with it — as marvels, for whom law and jus- 
tice and ancient possessions ought to be set aside, that 
this patronage (very valuable because selected from 
the whole diocese) of the two heads of the church is 
liable to all the accidents of succession — that it may 
fall into the hands of a superannuated wife, of a profli- 
gate son, of a weak daughter, or a rapacious creditor 
— that it may be brought to the hammer, and publicly 
bid for at an auction, like all the other chattels of the 
palace ; and that such have been the indignities to 
which this optional patronage has been exposed, from 
the earliest days of the church to this moment. Truly, 
men who live in houses of glass (especially where the 
panes are so large) ought not to fling stones; or if 
they do, they should be specially careful at whose 
head they are flung. 

And then the patronage which is not seized — the 
patronage which the chapter is allowed to present to 
its own body — may be divided without their consent. 
Can any thing be more thoroughly lawless, or unjust 
than this — that my patronage during my life shall be 
divided without my consent? How do my rights 
during my life differ from those of a lay patron, who 
is tenant for life ? and upon what principle of justice 
or common sense is his patronage protected from the 
commissioners' dividing power to which mine is sub- 
jected? That one can sell, and the other cannot sell, 
the next presentation, would be bad reasoning if it 
were good law ; but it is not law, for an ecclesiastical 
corporation, aggregate or sole, can sell a next presen- 
tation as legally as a lay life-tenant can do. They 
have the same power of selling as laymen, but they 
never do so; that is, they dispense their patronage 
with great propriety and delicacy, which, in the esti- 
mate of the commissioners, seems to make their right 
weaker, and the reasons for taking it away more pow- 
erful. 

Not only are laymen guarded by the same act 
which gives the power of dividing livings to the com- 
missioners, but bishops are also guarded. The com- 
missioners may divide the livings of chapters without 
their consent ; but before they can touch the living of 
a bishop, his consent must be obtained. It seems, 
after a few of these examples, to become a little 
clearer, and more intelligible, why the appointment 
of any other ecclesiastics than bishops was so disa- 
agreeable to the bench. 

The reasoning, then, is this : If a good living is va- 
cant in the patronage of a chapter, they will only 
think of conierring it on one ot their body or their 
friends. If such a living falls to the gift of a bishop, 
he will totally overlook the interests of his sons and 
daughters, and divide the living into small portions 



* Can any thing Jie more shabby in a government legis- 
lating upon church abuses, than to pass over such scandals 
as these existing in high places ? Two years have passed, 
and they are unnoticed. 

* The options of the Archbishop of York are compara- 
tively trifling. I never heard, at any period, that they 
have been sold; but they remain, like those of Canterbury, 
in the absolute possession of the archbishop's repreresenta- 
tives after his death. I will answer for it that the present 
archbishop will do every thing with them which becomes 
his liigh station and high character. They ought to be 
abolished by act of Parliament. 



for the good of the public ; and with these sort of anil 
ities, whig leaders, whose interest it is to lull the bish- 
ops into a reform, pretend to be satisfied ; and upon 
this intolerable nonsense they are not ashamed to jus- 
tify spoliation.* 

A division is set up between public and private 
patronage, and it is pretended that one is holden in 
trust for the public, the other in private property. 
This is mere theory — a slight film thrown over conve- 
nient injustice. Henry VIII. gave to the Duke of 
Bedford much of his patronage. Roger de Hoveden 
gave to the church of St. Paul's much of his patronage 
before the Russells were in existence. The Duke has 
the legal power to give his preferment to whom he 
pleases— so have we. We are both under the same 
moral and religious restraint to administer that pa- 
tronage properly — the trust is precisely the same to 
both ; and if the public good requires it, the power of 
dividing livings without the consent of patrons should 
be given in all instances, and not confined as a mark 
of infamy to cathedrals alone. This is not the real 
reason of the difference : bishops are the active mem- 
bers of the commission — they do not choose that their 
own patronage should be meddled with, and they 
know that the laity would not allow for a moment that 
their livings should be pulled to pieces by bishops , 
and that if such a proposal were made, there would 
be more danger of the bishop being pulled to pieces 
than the living. The real distinction is, between the 
weak and the strong — between those who have power 
to resist encroachment, and those who have not. This 
is the reason why we are selected for experiment, and 
so it is with all the bill from beginning to end. There 
is purple and fine linen in every line of it. 

Another strong objection to the dividing power ot 
the commission is this : according to the printed bill 
brought forward last session, if the living is not taken 
by some members of the body, it lapses to the bishop. 
Suppose, then, the same person to be bishop and com- 
missioner, he breaks the living into little pieces as a 
commissioner, and after it is rejected in its impover- 
ished state by the chapter, he gives it away as bishop 
of the diocese. The only answer that is given to such 
objections is, the impeccability of bishops ; and upon 
this principle the whole bill has been constructed, and 
here is the great mistake about bishops. They are, 
upon the whole, very good and worthy men; but they 
are not (as many ancient ladies suppose) wholly ex- 
empt from human infirmities : they have their malice, 
hatred, uncharitableness, persecution, and interest like 
other men ; and an administration who did not think 
it more magnificent to laugh at the lower clergy, than 
to protect them, should suffer no ecclesiastical bill to 
pass through Parliament without seriously consider- 
ing how its provisions may affect the happiness of 
poor clergymen pushed into living tombs, and pining 
in solitude — 

Vates procul atque in sola relegant 
Pascua, post montem oppositum, et trans flumina lata. 

There is a practice among some bishops, which may 
as well be mentioned here as any where else, but' 
which, I think, cannot be too severely reprobated. 
They send for a clergyman, and insist upon his giving ; 
evidence respecting the character and conduct of his 
neighbour. Does he hunt ? Does he shoot ? Is he • 
in debt ? Is he temperate ? Does he attend to his - 
parish ? &c. &c. Now what is this, but to destroy for 
all clergymen the very elements of social life-^to put I 
an end to all confidence between man and man — and 
to disseminate among gentlemen, who are bound to 
live in concord, every feeling of resentment, hatred, 
and suspicion ? But the very essence of tyranny is to* 
act, as if the finer feelings, like the finer dishes, were 
delicacies only for the rich and great, and that little 
people have no taste for them and no right to them. A\ 
good and honest bishop (I thank God there are many^ 
who deserve that character !) ought to suspect himself! 
and carefully to watch his own heart. He is all of a 

* These reasonings have had their effect, and many earlyi 
acts of injustice of the commission have been subsequently 
corrected. 



FIRST LETTER TO ARCHDEACON SINGLETON. 



273 



sadden elevated from being a tutor, dining at an early- 
hour with his pupil, (and occasionally, it is believed, 
on cold meat,) to be a spiritual lord ; he is dressed in 
a magnificent dress, decorated with a title, flattered by 
chaplains, and surrounded by little people looking up 
for the things which he has to give away ; and this 
often happens to a man who has had no opportunities 
of seeing the world, whose parents were in very hum- 
ble life, and who has given up all his thoughts to the 
frogs of Aristophanes and the Targum of Onkelos. 
How is it possible that such a man should not loose his 
head? that he should not swell? That he should not 
be guilty of a thousand follies, and worry and tease to 
death (before he recovers bis common sense) an 
hundred men as good and as wise and as able as him- 
self?* 

The history of the division of Edmonton has, I un- 
derstand, been repeatedly stated in the commission — ■ 
and told, as it has been, by a decided advocate, and 
with no sort of evidence called for on the other side of 
the question, has produced an unfair impression 
against chapters. The history is shortly this : — Be- 
sides the mother church of Edmonton, there are two 
chapels — Southgate and Winchmore Hill chapels. 
Winchmore Hill chapel was built by the society for 
building churches upon the same plan as the portions 
of Marylebone are arranged ; the clergyman was to 
be remunerated by the lease of the pews, and if cu- 
rates with talents for preaching had been placed there, 
they might have gained ,£200 per annum. Though 
men of perfectly respectable and honourable character, 
they were not endowed with this sort of talent, and 
they gained no more than £90 to £100 per annum. 
The Bishop of London applied to the cathedral of St. 
Paul's, to consent to £250 per annum in addition to 
the proceeds from the letting of the pews, or that pro- 
portion to the whole value of the living, should be al- 
lotted to the chapel of Winchmore ; and at the same 
time we received an application from the chapel at 
Southgate, that another considerable portion, I forget 
, what, but believe it to have been rather less (perhaps 
£200) should be allotted to them, and the whole living 
severed into three parishes. Now the living of Ed- 
monton is about £1,350 per annum, besides surplice 
fees, but this £1,350 depends upon a corn rent of 10s. 
3d. per bushel, present valuation, which, at the next 
valuation, would in the opinion of eminent land sur- 
veyors whom we consulted, be reduced to about 6s. per 
bushel, so that the living, considering the reduction 
also of all voluntary offerings to the church, would be 
reduced one half, and this half was to be divided into 
three, and one or two curates (two curates by the pre- 
sent bill) to be kept by the vicar of the old church ; 
and thus three clerical beggars were, by the activity 
of the Bishop of London, to be established in a district 
where the extreme dearness of all provisions is the 
plea for making the see of London double in value to 
that of any bishopric in the country. To this we de- 
clined to agree ; and this, heard only on one side, with 
the total omission of the changing value of the benefice 
from the price of corn, has most probably been the 
parent of the clause in question. The right cure for 
this and all similar cases would be to give the bishop 
a power of allotting to such chapels as high a salary 
as to any other curate in the diocese, taking as part of 
that salary, whatever was received from the lease of 
the pews, and to this no reasonable man could or 
would object : but this is not enough — all must bow to 
one man — l Chapters must be taught submission. No 
pamphlets, no meeting of independent prebendaries, 
to remonstrate against the proceedings of their supe- 
riors — no opulence and ease but mine. 5 

Some effect was produced also upon the commission, 
by the evidence of a prelate, who is both dean and 
bishop,! and who gave it as his opinion that the pa- 

* Since writing this, and after declining the living for 
myself, I ha? e had the pleasure of seeing it presented in an 
undivided state to my amiable and excellent friend Mr. 
Taite, who, after a long life of moods and tenses, has ac- 
quired (as he deserved) ease and opulence in his old age. 

f This prelate stated it as his opinion to the commission, 
that in future all prelates ought to declare that they held 
their patronage in trust for the public. 



tronage of bishops was given upon better principles 
than that of chapters, which, translated intc fair Eng- 
lish, is no more than this — that the said witness, not 
meaning to mislead, but himself deceived, has his 
own way entirely in his diocese, and can only have it 
partially in his chapter. 

There is a rumour that these reasonings, with which 
they were assailed from so many quarters in the last 
session of Parliament, have not been without their 
effect, and that it is the intention of the commissioners 
only to take away the patronage from the cathedrals 
exactly in proportion as the number of their members 
are reduced. Such may be the intention of the com- 
missioners ; but as that intention has not been publicly 
notified, it depends only upon report ; and the commis- 
sioners have changed their minds so often, that they 
may alter their intentions twenty times again before 
the meeting of Parliament. The whole of my obser- 
vations in this letter are grounded upon their bills of 
last yea?- — which Lord John Russell stated his inten- 
tion of re-introducing at the beginning of this session. 
If they have any new plans, they ought to have pub- 
lished them three months ago — and to have given to 
the clergy an ample opportunity of considering them : 
but this they take the greatest care never to do. The 
policy of the government and of the commissioners is 
to hurry their bills through with such rapidity, that 
very little time is given to those who suffer by them 
for consideration and remonstrance, and we must be 
prepared for the worst beforehand. You are cashiered 
and confiscated before you can look about you — if you 
leave home for six weeks, in these times, you find a 
commissioner in possession of your house and office. 

A report has reached my ears, that though all other 
cathedrals are to retain patronage exactly equal to 
their reduced numbers, a separate measure of justice 
is to be used for St. Paul's ; that our numbers are to 
be augmented by a fifth ; and our patronage reduced 
by a third ; and this immediately on the passing of 
the bill. That the Bishop of Exeter, for instance, is 
to receive his augmentation of patronage only in pro- 
portion as the prebendaries die off", and the preben- 
diaries themselves will, as long as they live, remain 
in the same proportional state as to patronage ; and 
that when they are reduced to four (their stationary 
number) , they will retain one-third of all the patron- 
age the twelve now possess. Whether this is wise or 
not, is a separate question, but at least it is just ; the 
four who remain cannot with any colour of justice 
complain that they do not retain all the patronage 
which was divided among twelve ; but at St. Paul's 
not only are our numbers to be augmented by a fifth, 
but the patronage of fifteen of our best livings is to be 
instantly conferred upon the Bishop of London. This 
little episode of plunder involves three separate acts ot 
gross injustice : in the first place, if only our numbers 
had been augmented by a fifth (in itself a mere bonus 
to commissioners), our patronage would have been re- 
duced one-fifth in value. Secondly, one-third of the 
preferment is to be taken away immediately, and 
these two added together make eight-fifteenths, or 
more than one-half of our whole patronage. So that, 
when all the cathedrals are reduced to their reformed 
numbers, each cathedral will enjoy precisely the same 
proportion of patronage as it now does, and each 
member of every other cathedral will have precisely 
the same means of promoting men of merit or men ot 
his own family, as is now possessed ; while less than 
half of these advantages will remain to St. Paul's. 
Thirdly, if the Bishop of London were to wait (as all 
the other bishops by this arrangement must wait) till 
the present patrons die off, the injustice would be to 
the future body; but by this scheme, every present 
incumbent of St. Paul's is instantly deprived of eight- 
fifteenths of his patronage ; while every other member 
of every other cathedral (as far as patronage is con- 
cerned) remains precisely in the same state in which 
he was before. Why this blow is levelled against St. 
Paul's I cannot conceive ; still less can I imagine why 
the Bishop of London is not to wait, as all other 
bishops are forced to wait, for the death of the pre- 
sent patrons. There is a reason, indeed, for not wait- 
ing, by which (had I to do with a person of less ele- 



274 



WORKS OF THE REV. SIDNEY SMITH. 



vated character than the Bishoj of London) I would 
endeavour to explain this precipitate seizure of patron- 
age — and that is, that the livings assigned to him in 
this remarkable scheme are all very valuable, and the 
incumbents all very old. But I shall pass over this 
scheme as a mere supposition, invented to bring the 
commission into disrepute, a scheme to which it is 
utterly impossible the commissioners should ever 
affix their names. 

I should have thought, if the love of what is just had 
not excited the commissioner bishops, that the ridicule 
of men voting such comfortable things to themselves 
as the prebendal patronage would have alarmed them ; 
but they want to sacrifice with other men's hecatombs, 
and to enjoy, at the same time, the character of great 
disinterestedness, and the luxury of unjust spoliation. 
It was thought necessary to make a fund ; and the 
prebends in the gift of the bishops* were appropriated 
to that purpose. The. bishops who consented to this 
have then made a great sacrifice — true, but they have 
taken more out of our pockets than they have dis- 
bursed from their own ; where then is the sacrifice ? 
They must either give back the patronage or the mar- 
tyrdom: if they choose to be martyrs — which I hope 
they will do — let them give us back our patronage : if 
they prefer the patronage, they must not talk of being 
martyrs — they cannot effect this double sensuality 
and combine the sweet flavour of rapine with the aro- 
matic odour of sanctity. 

We are told, if you agitate these questions among 
yourselves, you will have the democratic Philistines 
come down upon you, and sweep you all away toge- 
ther. Be it so ; I am quite ready to be swept away 
when the time comes. Every body has his favourite 
death ; some delight in apoplexy, and others prefer 
marasmus. I would infinitely rather be crushed by 
democrats, than, under the plea of the public good, be 
mildly and blandly absorbed by bishops. 

I met, the other day, in an old Dutch chronicle, 
with a passage so opposite to this subject, that though 
it is somewhat too light'for the occasion I cannot ab- 
stain from quoting it. There was a great meeting of 
all the clergy at Dordrecht, and the chronicler thus 
describes it, which I give in the language of the trans- 
lation : < And there was great store of bishops in the 
town, in their robes goodly to behold, and all the great 
men of the state were there, and folds poured in in 
boats on the Meuse, the Merve, the Rhine, and the 
Linge, coming from the Isle of Beverlandt, and Issel- 
mond, and from all quarters in the Bailiwick of Dort ; 
Arminians and Gomarists, with the friends of John 
Barneveldt and of Hugh Grote. And before my lords 
the bishops, Simon of Gloucester, who was a bishop 
in those parts, disputed with Vorstius, and Leoline 
the Monk, and many texts of Scripture were bandied 
to and fro ; and when this was done, and many propo- 
sitions made, and it waxed towards twelve of the 
clock, my lords the bishops prepared to set them 
down to a fair repast, in which was great store of 
good things — and among the rest a roasted peacock, 
having in lieu of a tail, the arms and banners of the 
archbishop, which was a goodly sight to all who 
favoured the church— and then the archbishop would 
say a grace, as was seemly to do, he being a very 
holy man ; but ere he had finished, a great mob of 
townspeople and folks from the country, who were 
gathered under the window, cried out, Bread '.. bread! 
for there was a great famine, and wheat had risen to 
three times the ordinary price of the sleich ;* and 
when they had done crying Bread ! bread ! they called 
out No bishops ! — and began to cast up stones at the 
windows. Whereat my lords the bishops were in a 
great fright, and cast their dinner out oi the window 

* The bishops have, however, secured for themselves all 
the livings which were in the separate gifts of prebenda- 
ries and deans, and they have received from the crown a 
very large contribution of valuable patronage; why or 
wherefore, is known only to the unfathomable wisdom of 
ministers. The glory cf martyrdom can be confined only 
at best to the bishops of the old cathedrals, for there are 
scarcely any separate prebends in the new cathedrals. 

* A measure in the Bailiwick of Dort, containing two gal- 
lons one p2nt English dry measure. 



to appease the mob, and so the men of that town were 
well pleased, and did devour the meats with a great 
appetite ; and then you might have seen my lords 
standing with empty plates, and looking wistfully at 
each other, till Simon of Gloucester, he who disputed 
with Leoline the Monk, stook up among them and 
said, " Good my lords, is it your pleasure to stand here 
fasting, and those who count lower in the church than 
you do should feast and fluster ? Let us order to us the 
dinner of the deans and canons, which is making ready 
for them in the chamber below." And this speech of 
Simon of Gloucester pleased the bishops much ; and 
so they sent for the host, one William of Ypres, and 
told him it was for the public good, and he, much fear- 
ing the bishops, brought them the dinner of the deans 
and canons ; and so the deans and canons went away 
without dinner, and were pelted by the men of the 
town, because they had not put meat out of the win- 
dow like the bishops ; and when the count came to 
hear of it, he said it was a pleasant conceit, and that 
the bishops were right cunning men, and had ding : d the 
canons well.'' 

When I talk of sacrifices, I mean the sacrifices of the 
bishop commissioners, for we are given to understand 
that the great mass oi bishops were never consulted at 
all about these proceedings ; that they are contrary to 
everything which consultations at Lambeth, previous 
to the commission, had led them to expect ; and that 
they are totally disapproved of b) r them. The volun- 
tary sacrifice, then, (for it is no sacrifice if it is not 
voluntary.) is in the bishop commissioners only ; and 
besides the indemnification which they have voted to 
themselves out of the patronage of the cathedrals, they 
will have all that never-ending patronage which is to 
proceed from the working of the commission, and the 
endowments bestowed upon different livings. So much 
for episcopal sacrifices ! 

And who does not see the end and meaning of all 
this? The lay commissioners, who are members oi 
the government, cannot and will not attend — the Arch 
bishops of York and Canterbury are quiet and amiable 
men, fast going down in the vale of life — some ol the 
members of the commission are expletives — some must 
be absent in their dioceses — the Bishop of London is 
passionately fond of labour, has certainly no aversion to 
power, is quick of temper, great ability, thoroughly 
versant in ecclesiastical law, and alwaj's in London. 
He will become the commission, and when the Church 
of England is mentioned, it will only mean Charles 
James, of London, who will enjoy a greater power than 
has been possessed by any churchman since the days of 
Laud, and will become the Church of England here 
upon earth. As for the commission itself, there is 
scarcely any power which is not given to it. They 
may call for every paper in the world, and every human 
creature who possesses it; and do what they like to 
one or the other. It is hopeless to contend with such a 
body ; and most painful to think that it has been estab- 
lished under a whig government.* A commission of 
tory churchmen, established for such purposes, should 
have been Iramed with the utmost jealousy, and strAh 
the most cautious circumspection of its powers, and 
with the most earnest wish for its extinction when the 
purposes of its creation were answered. The govern 
ment have done everything in their power to make it 
vexatious, omnipotent, and everlasting. This immense 
power, flung into the hands of an individual, is one of 
the many foolish consequences which proceed from 
the centralization of the bill, and the unwillingness to 
employ the local knowledge of the bishops in the pro- 
cess of annexing dignified to parochial preferment. 

There is a third bill concocted by the commission- 
bishops, in which the great principle of increasing the 
power of the bench has certainly not been lost sight of. 
a brother clergyman, falls suddenly ill in 



the country, and he begs his clerical neighbour to do 
duty for him in the afternoon, thinking it better that 
there should be single service in two churches, than 

* I am speaking here of the permanent commission esta- 
blished by act of Parliament in 1835. The commission for 
reporting had come to an end six months before this letter 
was written. 



FIRST LETTER TO ARCHDEACON SINGLETON. 



27* 



two services in one, and none in the other. The cler- 
gyman who accedes to this request is liable to a penalty 
of £5. There is an harshness and ill-nature in this — a 
gross ignorance of the state of the poorer clergy — an 
hard-heartedness produced by the long enjoyment of 
wealth and power, which makes it quite intolerable . I 
speak of it as it stands in the bill of last year.* 

If a clergyman has a living of £400 per annum , and a 
population of two thousand persons, the bishop can 
compel him to keep a curate, to whom he can allot any 
salary which he may allot to any other curate ; in other 
words, he may take away half the income of the clergy- 
man, and instantly ruin him — and this without any 
complaint from the vestry, — with every testimonial of 
the most perfect satisfaction of the parish in the labours 
of a minister who may, perhaps, be dedicating his 
whole life to their improvement. I think I remember 
that the Bishop of London once attempted this before 
he was a commissioner, and was defeated. I had no 
manner of doubt that it would speedily become the 
law, after the commission had begun to operate. The 
Bishop of London is said to have declared, after this 
trial, that if it was not law, it should soon be lr w ;| and 
law, you will see, it will become. In fact, he can slip 
into any ecclesiastical act of Parliament anything he 

£ leases. There is nobody to heed, or to contradict 
im — provided the power of bishops is extended by it ; 
no bishop is so ungenteel as to oppose the act of his 
right reverend brother ; and there are not many men 
who have knowledge, eloquence, or force of character 
to stand up against the Bishop of London, and, above 
all, of industry to watch him. The ministry, and the 
lay lords, and the House of Commons, care nothing 
about the matter ; and the clergy themselves, in a state 
of the greatest ignorance as to what is passing in the 
world, find their chains heavier and heavier, without 
knowing who or what has produced the additional 
incumbrance. A good, honest whig minister should 
have two or three parish priests in his train, to watch 
the bishops' bills, and to see that they wereconstructed 
on other principles than that bishops can do no wrong, 
and cannot have too much power. The whigs do nothing 
of this, and yet they complain that they are hated by 
the clergy, and that in all elections the clergy are their 
bitterest enemies. Suppose they were to try a little 
justice, a little notice, and a little protection. It would 
take more time than quizzing, and contempt, but it 
might do some good. 

The bishop puts a great number of questions to his 
clergy, which they are to be compelled, by this new 
law of the commission, to answer, under a penalty, 
and if they do answer them, they incur, perhaps, a 
still heavier penalty. ' Have you had two services in 
your church all the year ?' — < I decline to answer.' — 
■ Then I fine you20Z.' — ' I have only had one service.' 
— * Then I fine you 250Z.' In what other profession are 
men placed between this double fire of penalties, and 
compelled to criminate themselves ? It has been dis- 
used in England, I believe, ever since the time of Laud 
and the Star Chamber.^ 

By the same bill, as it first emanaced from the com- 
mission, a bishop could compel a clergyman to expend 
three years' income upon a house in which he had re- 
sided, perhaps, fifty years, and in which he had brought 
up a large family. With great difficulty, some slight 
modification of this enormous power was obtained, 
and it was a little improved in the amended bill.§ In 

* This is also given up. 

t The Bishop of London denies that he ever said this; hut 
the Bishop of London affects short sharp sayings, seasoned, 
lam afraid, sometimes with a little indiscretion ; and these 
savings are not necessarily forgotten because he forgets 
them. 

X This attempt upon the happiness and independence of 
the clergy has been abandoned. 

§ I perceive that the Archbishop of Canterbury borrows 
money for the improvement of his palace, and pays the 
principal off in forty years. This is quite as soon as a debt 
incurred for such public purposes ought to be paid off, and 
the archbishop has. done rightly to take that period. In 
process of time I think it very likely that this indulgence 
will be extended to country clergymen, who are compelled 
to pay off the debts for buildings (which they are compelled 
to undertake) in twenty years ; and by the new bill, not yet 



the same way an attempt was made to try delinquent 
clergymen, by a jury of clergymen, nominated by the 
bishop : but this was too bad, and was not endured for 
an instant : still, it showed the same love of power 
and the same principle of impeccability, for the bill is 
expressly confined to all suits and complaints against 
persons below the dignity and degree of bishops. The 
truth is, that there are very few men in either House 
of Parliament (ministers, or any one else,) who ever 
think of the happiness and comfort of the working 
clergy, or bestow one thought upon guarding them 
from the increased and increasing power of their en 
croaching masters. What is called taking care of the 
church is taking caking care of the bishops ; and all 
bills for the management of the clergy are left to the 
concoction of men who very naturally believe they 
are improving the church when they are increasing 
their own power. There are many bishops too gene"- 
rous, too humane, and too Christian, to oppress a poor 
clergyman ; but I have seen (I am sorry to say) many 
grievous instances of partiality, rudeness, and oppres- 
sion.* I have seen clergymen treated by them with a 
violence and contempt which the lowest servant in the 
bishop's establishment would not have endured for a 
single moment ; and if there is a helpless, friendless, 
wretched being in the community, it is a poor clergy- 
man in the country with a large family. If there is an 
object of compassion, he is one. If there is any occasion 
in life where a great man should lay aside his office, 
and put on those kind looks, and use those kind words 
which raise the humble from the dust, these are the 
occasions when those best parts of the Christian cha- 
racter ought to be displayed. 

I would instance the unlimited power which a bishop 
possesses over a curate, as a very unfair degree of 
power for any man to possess. Take the following 
dialogue which represents a real event. 

Bishop. Sir, I understand yon frequent the meetings 
of the Bible Society. 

Curate. Yes, my lord, I do. 

Bishop. Sir, I tell you, plainly, if you continue to 
do so, I shall silence you from preaching in my dio- 
cese. 

Curate. My lord, I am very sorry to incur your in- 
dignation, but I frequent that society upon principle, 
because I think it eminently serviceable to the cause 
of the Gospel. 

Bishop. Sir, I do not enter into your reasons, but 
tell you plainly, if you continue to go there you shall 
be silenced. 

The young man did go, and was silenced — and as 
bishops have always a great deal of clever machinery 
at work of testimonials and bene-decessits, and always 
a lawyer at their elbow, under the name of a secreta- 
ry, a curate excluded from one diocese is excluded 
from all. His remedy is an appeal to the archbishop 
from the bishop ; his worldly goods, however, amount 
to ten pounds ; he never was in London ; he dreads 
such a tribunal as an archbishop ; he thinks, perhaps, 
in time, the bishop may be softened, if he is compelled 
to restore him, the enmity will be immortal. It would 
be just as rational to give to a frog or a rabbit, upon 
which the physician is about to experimeut, an appeal 
to the Zoological Society, as to give to a country cu- 
rate an appeal to the archbishop against his purple 
oppressor. 

The errors of the bill are a public concern — the in- 
justice of the bill is a private concern. Give us our 
patronage for life.f Treat the cathedrals all alike, 
with the same measure of justice. Don't divide livings 
in the patronage of present incumbents without their 
consent — or do the same with all livings. If these 

passed, this indulgence is extended to thirty years. Why 
poor clergymen have been compelled for the last five years 
to pay off the incumbrances at the rate of one twentieth 
per annum, and are now compelled to pay them off, or will, 
when the bill passes, be so compelled, at the rate of one 
thirtieth per annum, when the archbishop takes forty years 
to do the same thing, and has made that bargain in the 
year 1831, 1 really cannot tell. A clergyman who does not 
reside, is forced to pay off his building debt in ten years. 

* What bishops like best in their clergy is a droppingdown 
deadness of manner. 

f This has now been given to us. 



276 



WORKS OF THE REV. SIDNEY SMITH. 



points are attended to in the forthcoming bill, all com- 
plaint of unfairness and injustice will be at an end. I 
shall still think, that the commissioners have been 
very rash and indiscreet, that they have evinced a 
contempt for existing institutions, and a spirit of de- 
struction which will be copied to the life hereafter, by 
commissioners of a very different description. Bishops 
live in high places with high people, or with little 
people who depend upon them. They walk delicately, 
like Agag. They hear only one sort of conversation, 
and avoid bold reckless men, as a lady veils herself 
from rough breezes. I am half inclined to think, 
sometimes, that the bishop-commissioners really think 
that they are finally settling the church; that the 
House of Lords will be open to the bench for ages ; 
and that many archbishops in succession will enjoy 
their fifteen thousand pounds a year in Lambeth. I 
wish I could do for the bishop-commissioners what 
his mother did for vEneas, in the last days of Troy : 

' Omnem quae nunc obducta tuenti 
Mortales hebetat visus tibi, ethumida circum 
Caligat, nubem eripiam. 
Apparent dirse fades,' &c. &c. 

It is ominous for liberty, when Sydney and Russell 
cannot agree ; but when Lord John Russell in the 
House of Commons, said we showed no disposition to 
make any sacrifices for the good of the church, I took 
the liberty to remind that excellent person that he 
must first of all prove it to be for the good of the 
church that our patronage should be taken away by 
the bishops, and then he might find fault with us for 
not consenting to the sacrifice. 

I have little or no personal nor pecuniary interest in 
these things, and have made all possible exertion (as 
two or three persons in the power well know) that 
they should not come before the public. I have no 
&on nor son-in-law in the church, for whom I want any 
patronage. If I were young enough to survive any 
incumbent of St. Paul's, my own preferment is too 
agreeably circumstanced to make it at all probable I 
should avail myself of the opportunity. I am a sincere 
advocate for church reform : but I think it very possi- 
ble, and even very easy, to have removed all odium 
from the establishment in a much less violent and 
revolutionary manner, without committing or attempt- 
ing such flagrant acts of injustice, and without leaving 
behind an odious court of inquisition, which will in- 
evitably fall into the hands of a single individual, and 
will be an eternal source of vexation, jealousy, and 
change. I give sincere credit to the commissioners 
for good intentions ; how can such men have intended 
any thing but good ? And I firmly believe that they 
are hardly conscious of the extraordinary predilection 
they have shown for bishops in all their proceedings ; 
it is like those errors in tradesmen's bills of which 
the. retail arithmetician is really unconscious, but 
which, somehow or another, always happen to be in 
his own favour. Such men as the commissioners do 
not say this patronage belongs justly to the cathe- 
drals, and we will take it away unjustly for ourselves ; 
but, after the manner of human nature, a thousand 
weak reasons prevail, which would have no effect, if 
self-interest were not concerned ; they are practising 
a deception on themselves, and sincerely believe they 
are doing right. When I talk of spoil and plunder, I 
do not speak of the intention, but of the effect, and 
the precedent. 

Still the commissioners are on the eve of entailing 
an immense evil upon the country, and unfortunately, 
they have gone so far, that it is necessary they should 
ruin the cathedrals, to preserve their character for 
consistency. They themselves have been frightened 
a great deal too much by the mob ; have overlooked 
the chances in their favour produced by delay ; have 
been afraid of being suspected (as tones) of not do- 
ing enough; and have allowed themselves to be hurri- 
ed on by the constitutional impetuosity of one man, 
who cannot be brought to believe that wisdom often 
consists in leaving alone, standing still, and doing no- 
thing. From the joint operation of all these causes, 
all the cathedrals of England will, in a few weeks, be 
knocked about our eais. You, Mr. Archdeacon Sin- 



gleton, will sit like Caius Marius on the ruins, and we 
shall lose for ever the wisest scheme for securing a 
well-educated clergy upon the most economical terms, 
and for preventing that low fanaticism which is the 
greatest curse of human happiness, and the greatest 
enemy of true religion. We shall have all the evils of 
an establishment, and none of its good. 

You tell me 1 shall be laughed at as a rich and 
overgrown churchman ; be it so. I have been laugh- 
ed at a hundred times in my life, and care little or no- 
thing about it. If I am well provided tor now — I have 
had my full share of the blanks in the lottery as the 
prizes. Till thirty years of age I never received a 
farthing from the church ; then 50Z. per annum for two 
years — then nothing for ten years — then 500Z. per an- 
num, increased for two or three years to 800/, till, in 
my grand climacteric, I was made canon of St. Paul's ; 
and before that period, I had built a parsonage-house 
with farm offices for a large farm, which cost me 
4000Z., and had reclaimed another from ruins at the 
expense of 2000Z. A lawyer, or a physician in good 
practice, would smile at this picture of great ecclesi- 
astical wealth, and yet I am considered as a perfect 
monster of ecclesiastical prosperity. 

I should be very sorry to give offence to the dignifi- 
ed ecclesiastics who are in the commission ; I hope 
they will allow for the provocation, if I have been a 
little too warm in the defence of St. Paul's, which I 
have taken a solemn oath to defend. I was at school 
and college with the Archbishop of Canterbury ; fifty- 
three years ago he knocked me down with the chess- 
board for check-mating him — and now he is attempt- 
ing to take away my patronage. I believe these are 
the only two acts of violence he ever committed in his 
life : the interval has been one of gentleness, kind- 
ness, and the most amiable and high-principled court- 
esy to his clergy. For the Archbishop of York, I feel 
an affectionate respect — the result of that invariable 
kindness I have received from him : and who can see 
the Bishop of London without admiring his superior 
talents — being pleased with his society, without ad- 
mitting that, upon the whole,* the public is benefited 
by his ungovernable passion for business ; and with- 
out receiving the constant workings of a really good 
heart, as an atonement for the occasional excesses of 
an impetuous disposition? I am quite sure if the ta- 
bles had been turned, and if it had been his lot, as a 
canon, to fight against the encroachment of bishops, 
that he would have made as stout a defence as I have 
done — the only difference is that he would have done 
it with much greater talent. 

As for my friends the whigs, I neither wish to of- 
fend them nor any body else. I consider myself to 
be as good a whig as any amongst them. I was a 
whig before many of them were born — and while 
some of them were tories and waverers. I have al- 
ways turned out to fight their battles, and when I saw 
no other clergyman turn out but myself — and this in 
times before liberality was well recompensed, and 
therefore in fashion, when the smallest appearance of 
it seemed to condemn a churchman to the grossest of 
obloquy, and the most hopeless poverty. It may suit 
the purpose of the ministers to flatter the bench ; it 
does not suit mine. I do not choose in my old age to 
be tossed as a prey to the bishops ; I have not deserv- 
ed this of my whig friends. I know very well there 
can be no justice for deans and chapters, and that the 
momentary lords of the earth will receive our state- 
ment with derision and persiflage — the great principle 
which is now called in for the government of mankind. 
Nobody admires the general conduct of the whig 
administration more than I do. They have conferred, 
in their domestic policy, the most striking benefits on 
the country. To say that there is no risk in what they 
have done is mere nonsense — there is great risk ; and 
all honest men must balance to counteract it — holding 
back as firmly down hill as they pulled vigorously up 
hill. Still, great as the risk is, it was worth while to 

* 1 have heard that the Bishop of London employs eight 
hours per day in the government of his diocese — in which 
no part of Asia, Africa, or America is included. The worid 
is, I believe, taking one day with another, governed in 
about a third of that time. 



SECOND LETTER TO ARCHDECON SIOGLETON. 



277 



incur it in the poor-law bill, in the tithe bill, in the 
corporation bill, and in the circumscription of the Irish 
Protestant Church. In all these matters, the whig mi- 
nistry, after the heat of party is over, and when Jo- 
seph Hume and Wilson Croker* are powdered into 
the dust of death, will gain great and deserved fame. 
In the question of the church commission they have 
behaved with the grossest injustice ; delighted to see 
this temporary delirium of archbishops and bishops, 
scarcely believing their eyes, and carefully suppress- 
ing their laughter, when they saw these eminent con- 
servatives laying about them with the fury of Mr. 
Tyler or Mr. Straw ; they have taken the greatest 
care not to disturb them, and to give them no offence : 
' Do as you like, my lords, with the chapters and the 
parochial clergy ; you will find some pleasing morsels 
in the ruins of the cathedrals. Keep for yourselves 
any thing you like — whatever is agreeable to you can- 
not be unpleasant to us.' In the mean time, the old 
friends of, and the old sufferers for, liberty, do not 
understand this new meanness, and are not a little as- 
tonished to find their leaders prostrate on their knees 
before the lords of the church, and to receive no other 
answer from them than that, if they, are disturbed in 
their adulation, they will immediately resign ! 
I remain, 

My dear Sir, 
With sincere good will and respect, 
Yours, 
SYDNEY SMITH. 



SECOND LETTER TO ARCHDEACON SINGLE- 
TON. 

My Dear Sir, 

It is a long time since you heard from me, and in 
the mean time the poor Church of England has been 
trembling, from the bishop who sitteth on the throne, 
to the curate who rideth upon the hackney horse. I 
began writing on the subject to avoid bursting from 
indignation ; and, as it is not my habit to recede, I 
will go on till the Church of England is either up or 
down — semianimous on its back, or vigorous on its 
legs. 

Two or three persons have said to me — l Why, af- 
ter writing an entertaining and successful letter to 
Archdeacon Singleton, do you venture upon another, 
in which you may probably fail, and be weak or stu- 
pid?' All this I utterly despise ; I write upon these 
matters not to be entertaining, but because the sub- 
jects are very important, and because I have strong 
opinions upon them. If what I write is liked, so much 
the better ; but liked or not liked, sold or not sold, 
Wilson Crokered or not Wilson Crokered, I will write. 
If you ask me who excites me, I answer you it is that 
judge who stirs good thoughts in honest hearts — under 
whose warrant I impeach the wrong, and by whose 
help I hope to chastise it. 

There are, in most cathedrals, two sorts of preben- 
daries — the one resident, the other non-resident. It is 
proposed by the church commission to abolish all the 
prebendaries of the latter and many of the former 
class, the resident prebendaries, whom I wish to 
save. 

The non-resident prebendaries never come near the 
cathedral ; they are just like so many country gentle- 
men ; the difference is, that their appointments are 
elective, not hereditary. They have their houses, 
manors, lands, and every appendage of territorial 
wealth and importance. Their value is very different. 
I have one, Neasdon, near Willesdon, which consists 
of a quarter of an acre of land, worth a few shillings 
per annum, but animated by the burden of repairing 
a bridge, which sometimes costs the unfortunate pre- 
bendary fifty or sixty pounds. There are other non- 
resident prebendaries, however, of great value : and 
one I believe, which would be worth, if the years or 
lives were run out, from 40,000Z to 60,000Z per annum. 

* I meant no harm by the comparison, but I have made 
two bitter enemies by it. 



Not only do these prebendaries do nothing, and are 
never seen, but the existence of the preferment, is 
hardly known; and the abolition of the preferment, 
therefore, would not in any degree lessen the tempta- 
tion to enter into the church, while the mass of these 
preferments would make an important fund for the im- 
provement of small livings. The residentiary preben- 
diaries, on the contrary, perform all the services of 
the cathedral church ; their existence is known, their 
preferment coveted, and to get a stall, and to be pre- 
ceded by men with silver rods, is the bait which the 
ambitious squire is perpetually holding out to his se- 
cond son. What prebendary is next to come into res- 
idence, is as important a topic to the cathedral town, 
and ten miles around it, as what the evening or morn- 
ing star may be to the astronomer. I will venture to 
say, that there is not a man of good humour, sense, 
and worth, within ten miles of Worcester, who does 
not hail the rising of Archdeacon Singleton in the hor- 
izon as one of the most agreeable events of the year. 
If such sort of preferments are extinguished, a very 
serious evil (as I have often said before) is done to 
the church — the service becomes unpopular, further 
spoliation is dreaded, the whole system is considered 
to be altered and degraded, capital is withdrawn from 
the church, and no one enters into the profession but 
the sons of farmers and little tradesmen, who would 
be footmen if they were not vicars — or figure on the 
coach-box if they were not lecturing from the pul- 
pit. 

But what a practical rebuke to the commissioners, 
after all their plans and consultations and carvings of 
cathedral preferment, to leave it integral, and un- 
touched ! It is some comfort, however, to me, to 
think that the persons of all others to whom this pre- 
servation of cathedral property would give the great- 
est pleasure, are the ecclesiastical commissioners 
themselves. Can any one believe that the Archbishop 
of Canterbury or the Bishop of London really wishes 
for the confiscation of any cathedral property, or that 
they were driven to it by any thing but fear, mingled, 
perhaps, with a little vanity of playing the part of 
great reformers? They cannot, of course, say for 
themselves what I say for them ; but of what is real- 
ly passing in the ecclesiastical minds of these great 
personages, I have no more doubt than I have of what 
passes in the mind of the prisoner when the prosecu- 
tor recommends and relents, and the judge says he 
shall attend to the recommendation. 

What harm does a prebend do, in a politico-econo- 
mical point of view? The alienation of the property 
for three lives, or twenty-one years, and the almost 
certainty that the tenant has of renewing, give him 
sufficient interest in the soil for all purposes of cultiva- 
tion,* and a long series of elected clergymen is rather 
more likely to produce valuable members of the com- 
munity than a long series of begotten squires. Take, 
for instance, the cathedral of Bristol, the whole estates 
of which are about equal to keeping a pack of fox- 
hounds. If this had been in the hands of a country 
gentleman ; instead of a precentor, succentor, dean, 
and canons,and sexton, you would have had huntsman, 
whipper-in, dog-feeders, and stoppers of earths ; the 
old squire, full of foolish opinions, and fermented li- 
quids, and a young gentleman of gloves, waistcoats, 
and pantaloons : and how many generations might it 
be before the fortuitous concourse of noodles would 
produce such a man as Professor Lee, one of the pre- 
bendaries of Bristol, and by far the most eminent ori- 
ental scholar in Europe ? The same argument might 
be applied to every cathedral in England. How many 
hundred coveys of squires would it take to supply as 
much knowledge as is condensed in the heads of Dr. 
Copplestone, or Mr. Taite, of St. Paul's ? and what a 



* The church, it has been urged, do not plant— they do 
not extend their woods ; but almost all cathedrals possess 
woods, and regularly plant a succession, so as to keep them 
up. A single evening of dice and hazard does not doom 
their woods to sudden destruction ; a life tenant does not 
cut down all the timber to make the most of his estate : the 
woods of ecclesiastical bodies are managed upon a fixed and 
settled plan, and considering the sudden prodigalities of 
laymen, I should not be afraid ^-f a comparison. 



27S 



WORKS OF THE REV. SIDNEY SMITH. 



strange thing it is that such a man as Lord John Rus- 
sell, the whig leader, should be so squirrel-minded as 
to wish for a movement without object or end ! Sav- 
ing there can be none, for it is merely taking from one 
ecclesiastic to give it to another ; public clamour, to 
which the best men must sometimes yield, does not 
require it : and so far from doing any good, it would 
be a source of infinite mischief to the establishment. 

If you were to gather a parliament of curates on the 
hottest Sunday in the year, after all the services, ser- 
mons, burials, and baptisms of the day were over, and 
to offer them such increase of salary as would be pro- 
duced by the confiscation of the cathedral property, I 
am convinced they would reject the measure, and pre- 
fer splendid hope, and the expectation of good fortune 
in advanced life, to the trifling improvement of pover- 
ty which such a fund could afford. Charles James, of 
London, was a curate ; the Bishop of Winchester was 
a curate ; almost every rose-and-shovel man has been 
a curate in his time. All curates hope to draw great 
prizes. 

I am surprised it does not strike the mountaineers 
how very much the great emoluments of the church 
are flung open to the lowest ranks of the community. 
Butchers, bakers, publicans,, schoolmasters, are per- 
petually seeing their children elevated to the mitre. 
Let a respectable baker drive through the city from 
the west end of the town, and let him cast an eye on 
the battlements of Northumberland House, has his lit- 
tle muffin-faced son the smallest chance of getting in 
among the Percies, enjoying a share of their luxury 
and splendour, and of chasing the deer with hound and 
horn upon the Cheviot Hills ? But let him drive his 
alum-steeped loaves a little farther, till he reaches St. 
Paul's churchyard, and all his thoughts are changed 
when he sees that beautiful fabric : it is not impossible 
that his little penny roll may be introduced into that 
splendid oven. Young Crumpet is sent to school — 
takes to his books — spends the best years of his life, 
as all eminent Englishmen do, in making Latin verses 
—knows that the crum in crum-pet is long, and the pet 
short — goes to the University — gets a prize for an Es- 
say on the Dispersion of the Jews— takes orders — be- 
comes a bishop's chaplain — has a young nobleman for 
his pupil — publishes an useless classic, and a serious 
call to the unconverted — and then goes through the 
Elysian transitions of prebendary, dean, prelate, and 
the long train of purple, profit, and power. 

It will not do to leave only four persons in each ca- 
thedral upon the supposition that such a number will 
be sufficient for all the men of real merit who ought to 
enjoy such preferment ; we ought to have a steady 
confidence that the men of real merit will always bear 
a small proportion to the whole number ; and that in 
proportion as the whole number is lessened, the num- 
ber of men of merit provided for will be lessened also. 
If it were quite certain that ninety persons would be 
selected, the most remarkable for conduct, piety, and 
learning, ninety offices might be sufficient ; but out of 
these ninety are to be taken tutors to dukes and mar- 
quises, paid in this way by the public ; bishop's chap- 
lains, running tame about the palace ; elegant clergy- 
men, of small understanding, who have made them- 
selves acceptable in the drawing-rooms of the mitre ; 
Billingsgate controversialists, who have tossed and 
gored an Unitarian. So that there remain but a few 
rewards for men of real merit — yet these rewards do 
infinite good ; and in this mixed, checkered way, hu- 
man affairs are conducted. 

No man at the beginning of the reform could tell to 
what excesses the new power conferred upon the mul- 
titude would carry them ; it was not safe for a clergy- 
man to appear in the streets. I bought a blue coat, 
and did not despair in time of looking like a layman. 
All this is passed over. Men are returned to their 
senses upon the subject of the church, and I utterly 
deny that there is any public feeling whatever which 
calls for the destruction of the resident prebends. 
Lord John Russell has pruned the two luxuriant bishop- 
rics, and has abolished pluralities : he has made a 
very material alteration in the state of the church : 
not' enough to please Joseph Hume and the tribunes of 
he people, but enough to satisfy every reasonable and 



moderate man, and, therefore, enough to satisfy him 
self. What another generation may choose to do, is 
another question: I am thoroughly convinced that 
enough has been done for the present. 

Viscount Melbourne declared himself quite satisfied 
with the church as it is ; but if the public had any 
desire to alter it, they might do as they pleased. He 
might have said the same thing of the monarchy, or 
of any other of our institutions ; and there is in the 
declaration a permissiveness and good humour which 
in public men have seldom been exceeded. Careless- 
ness, however, is but a poor imitation of genius ; and 
the formation of a wise and well-reflected plan of 
reform conduces more to the lasting fame of a minis- 
ter than that affected contempt of duty which every 
man sees to be mere vanity, and a vanity of no very- 
high description. 

But, if the truth must be told, our viscount is some- 
what of an impostor. " Everything about him seems to 
betoken careless desolation : any one would suppose 
from his manner that he was playing chuck-farthing 
with human happiness ; that he was always on the 
heel of pastime ; that he would giggle away the great 
charter, and decide by the method of tee-totum whe- 
ther my lords the bishops should or should not retain 
their seats in the House of Lords. All this is the 
mere vanity of surprising, and making us believe that 
he can play with kingdoms as other men can with 
nine-pins. Instead of this lofty nebulo — this miracle 
of moral and intellectual felicities — he is nothing more 
than a sensible, honest man, who means to do his duty 
to the sovereign and to the country : instead of being 
the ignorant man he pretends to be, before he meets 
the deputation of tallow-chandlers in the morning, he 
sits up halt the night talking with Thomas Young 
about melting and skimming, and then, though he has 
acquired knowledge enough to. work off a whole vat of 
prime Leicester tallow, he pretends next morning not 
to know the difference between a dip and a mould. In 
the same way, when he has been employed in reading- 
acts of Parliament, he would persuade you that he has 
been reading Cleghorn on the Beatitudes, or Pickler on 
the Nine Difficult Points. Neither can I allow to this 
minister (however he may be irritated by the denial) 
the extreme merit of indifference to the consequences 
of his measures. I believe him to be conscientiously 
alive to the good or evil that he is doing, and that his 
caution has more than once arrested the gigantic pro- 
jects of the Lycurgus of the Lower House. I am 
sorry to hurt any man's feelings, and to brush aAvay 
the magnificent fabric of levity and gaiety he has 
reared, — but I accuse our minister of honesty and dili- 
gence ; I deny that he is careless or rash : he is no- 
thing more than a man of good understanding, and 
good principle, disguised in the eternal and somewhat 
wearisome affectation of a political roue. 

One of the most foolish circumstances attending this 
destruction of cathedral property, is the great sacrifice 
of the patronage of the crown; the crown gives up 
eight prebends of Westminster, two at Worcester, 
£1,500 per annum at St. Paul's, two prebends at Bris- 
tol, and a great deal of other preferment all over the 
kingdom; and this at a moment when such extraordi- 
nary power has been suddenly conferred upon the peo- 
ple, and when every atom of power and patronage 
ought to be husbanded for the crown. A prebend of 
Westminster for my second son would soften the Catos 
of Cornhill, and lull the Gracchi of the metropolitan 
boroughs. Lives there a man so absurd as to suppose- 
that government can be carried on without those gen- 
tle allurements. You may as well attempt to poultice 
off the humps of a camel's back, as to cure mankind 
of these little corruptions. 

I am terribly alarmed by a committee of cathedrals 
now sitting in London, and planning a petition to the 
legislature to be heard by counsel. They will take 
such high ground, and talk a language so utterly at 
variance with the feelings of the age about church pro- 
perty, that I am afraid they will do more harm than 
good. In the time of Lord George Gordon's riots, the 
Guards said they did not care for the mob, if the gen- 
tlemen volunteers behind would be so good as not to 
hold their muskets in such a dangerous manner. I 



SECOND LETTER TO ARCHDEACON SINGLETON- 



279 



don't care for popular clamour, and think it might now 
6c defied; but I confess the gentlemen volunteers 
alarm me. They have unfortunately, too, collected 
their addresses, and published them in a single vo- 
lume ! ! ' 

I should like to know how many of our institutions 
at this moment, besides the cathedrals, are under no- 
tice of destruction. I will, before I finish my letter, 
endeavour to procure a list ; in the mean time I will 
give you the bill of fare with which the last session 
opened, and I think that of 1838 will not be less copi- 
ous. But at the opening of the session of 1837, when 
I addressed my first letter to you, this was the state of 
our intended changes : — The law of copyright was to 
be recreated by Serjeant Talfourd ; church-rates abo- 
lished by Lord John Russell, and imprisonment for 
debt by the attorney-general ; the Archbishop of Can- 
terbury kindly undertook to destroy all the cathedrals, 
and Mr, Grote was to arrange our voting by ballot ; 
the septennial act was to be repealed by Mr. Wil- 
liams — corn-laws abolished by Mr. Clay — and the 
House of Lords reformed by Mr. Ward ; Mr. Hume 
remodelled country- rates — Mr. Ewart put an end to 
primogeniture, and Mr. Tooke took away the exclu- 
sive privileges of Dublin, Oxford, and Cambridge ; 
Thomas Duncombe was to put an end to the proxies of 
the lords, and Sergeant Prime to turn the universities 
topsy-turvy. Well may it be said that 

'Man never continuethin one stay.' 

See how men accustom themselves to large • and 
perilous changes. Ten years ago, if a cassock or a 
hassock had been taken from the establishment, the 
current of human affairs would have been stopped till 
restitution had been made. In a fortnight's time, 
Lord John Russell is to take possession of, and to re- 
partition all the cathedrals in England ; and what a 
prelude for the young queen's coronation ! what a 
medal for the august ceremony ! — the fallen Gothic 
buildings on one side of the gold, the young Protestant 
queen on the other : — 

' Victoria Ecclesise Victrix.' 

And then, when she is full of noble devices, and of all 
sorts enchantingly beloved, and amid the solemn swell 
of music, when heartbeats happily, and her eyes look 
majesty, she turns them on the degraded ministers of 
the Gospel, and shudders to see she is stalking to the 
throne of her Protestant ancestors over the broken 
altars of God. 

Now, remember, I hate to overstate my case. I do 
not say that the destruction of cathedrals will put an 
end to railroads : I believe that good mustard and 
cress, sown after Lord John's bill is passed, will, if 
duly watered, continue to grow. I do not say that the 
country has no right, after the death of individual 
incumbents, to do what they propose to do ; — I merely 
say that it is inexpedient, uncalled for, and mischie- 
vous, — that the lower clergy, for whose sake it is pro- 
posed to be done, do not desire it, — that the bishop 
commissioners, who proposed it, would be heartily 
glad if it was put an end to, — that it will lower the 
character of those who enter into the church, and 
accustom the English people to large and dangerous 
confiscations : and I would not have gentlemen of the 
money-bags, and of wheat and bean land, forget that 
the church means many other things than Thirty-nine 
gLlticles, and a discourse of five-and-twenty minutes' 
duration on the Sabbath. It means a check to the 
conceited rashness of experimental reasoners — an ad- 
hesion to old moral landmarks — an attachment to the 
happiness we have gained from tried institutions, 
greate*- than the expectation of that which is promised 
by no\ elty and change. The loud cry of ten thousand 
teachers of justice and worship — that cry which mas- 
ters th e Borgias and CataZinesof the world, and guards 
from devastation the best works of God — 

Magna testantur voce per orbem 
Discite justitiam moniti et non temnere divos. 

Jn spite of his uplifted chess-board, I cannot let my 
old school-fellow, the Archbishop of Canterbury, off, 
without harping a little upon his oath, which he has 



taken to preserve the rights and property of the church 
of Canterbury : I am quite sure so truly good a man, 
as from the bottom of my heart I believe him to be, 
has some line of argument by which he defends him- 
self ; but till I know it, I cannot of course say I am 
convinced by it. The common defence for breaking 
oaths is, t^iat they are contracts made with another 
party, which the Creator is called to witness, and from 
which the swearer is absolved, if those for whom the 
oath is taken choose to release him from his obligation. 
With whom, then, is the contract made by the arch- 
bishop ? Is it with the community at large ? If so, 
nothing but an act of Parliament (as the community 
at large have no other organ) could absolve him from 
his oath ; but three years before any act is passed, he 
puts his name to a plan for taking away two-thirds of 
the property of the church of Canterbury. If the con- 
tract is not made with the community at large, but with 
the church of Canterbury, every member of it is in de- 
cided hostility to his scheme . O'Connell takes an oath 
that he will not injure nor destroy the Protestant 
church; but in promoting the destruction of some of 
the Irish bishoprics, he may plead that he is sacrificing 
a part to preserve the whole, and benefiting, not injur- 
ing, the Protestant establishment. But the archbishop 
does not swear to a general truth, where the principle 
may be preserved, though there is an apparent devia- 
tion from the words ; but he swears to a very narrow 
and limited oath, that he will not alienate the posses- 
sions of the church of Canterbury. A friend of mine 
has suggested to me that his grace has, perhaps, for- 
gotten the oath; but this cannot be, for the first Pro- 
testant in Europe of course makes a memorandum in 
his pocket-book of all the oaths he takes to do, or to 
abstain. The oath, however, may be less present to 
the archbishop's memory, from the fact of his not 
having taken the oath in person, but by the medium 
of a gentleman sent down by the coach to take it for 
him — a practice which, though I believe it to have 
been long established in the church, surprised me, I 
confess, not a little. A proxy to vote, if you please— 
a proxy to consent to arrangements of estates, if want- 
ed ; but a proxy sent down in the Canterbury fly, to 
take the Creator to witness that the archbishop, de- 
tained in town by business or pleasure, will never vio- 
late that foundation of piety over which he presides — 
all this seems to me an act of the most extraordinary 
indolence ever recorded in history. If an ecclesiastic, 
not a bishop, may express any opinion on the reforms 
of the church, I recommend that archbishops and 
bishops should take no more oaths by proxy ; but, as 
they do not wait upon the sovereign or the prime min- 
ister, or even any of the cabinet, by proxy, that they 
should also perform all religious acts in their own per- 
son . This practice would have been abolished in Lord 
John's first bill, if other grades of churchmen as well 
as bishops had been made commissioners. But the 
motto was — 

* Peace to the palaces — war to the manses.' 

I have been informed, though I will not answer for 
the accuracy of the information, that this vicarious 
oath is likely to produce a scene which would have 
puzzled the Ductor Dubitantium. The attorney, who 
took the oath for the archbishop, is, they say, seized 
with religious horrors at the approaching confiscation 
of Canterbury property, and has in vain tendered back 
his 6s. 8d. for taking the oath. The archbishop refu 
ses to accept it ; and feeling himself light and disen- 
cumbered, wisely keeps the saddle upon the back of 
the writhing and agonizing scrivener. I have talked 
it over with several clergymen, and the general opin- 
ion is, that the scrivener will suffer. 

I cannot help thinking that a great opportunity opens 
itself for improving the discipline of the church, by 
means of those chapters which Lord John Russell* is 



* I only mention Lord John Russell's name so often, be- 
cause the management of the church measures devolves up- 
on him. He is, beyond all comparison, the ablest man in 
the whole administration, and to such a degree is he supe- 
rior, that the government could not exist a moment without 
him. If the foreign secretary were to retire, we should no 
longer be nibbling ourselves into disgrace on the coast ol 



280 



WORKS OF THE REV. SIDNEY SMITH. 



so anxious to destroy ; divide the diocese among the 
members of the chapter, and make them responsible 
for the superintendence and inspection of the clergy 
in their various divisions under the supreme control ot 
the bishop ; by a few additions they might be made 
the bishops' council for the trial of delinquent clergy- 
men. They might be made a kind of college for the 
general care of education in the diocese, and applied 
to a thousand useful purposes, which would have oc- 
curred to the commissioners, if they had not been so 
dreadfully frightened, and to the government, if their 
object had been, not to please the dissenters, but to 
improve the church. 

The Bishop of Lincoln has lately published a pamph- 
let on the church question. His lordship is certainly 
not a man full of felicities and facilities, imitating 
none, and inimitable of any; nor does he work with 
infinite agitation of wit. His creation has blood with- 
out heat, bones without marrow, eyes without specu- 
lation. He has the art of saying nothing in many 
words beyond any man that ever existed ; and when 
he seems to have made a proposition, he is so dread- 
fully frightened at it, that he proceeds as quickly as 
possible, in the ensuing sentence, to disconnect the 
subject and the predicate, and to avert the dangers he 
has incurred : — but as he is a bishop, and will be there- 
fore more read than I am, I cannot pass him over. 
His lordship tells us, that it was at one time under 
consideration of the commissioners whether they 
should not tax all benefices above a certain value, in 
order to raise a fund for the improvement of smaller 
livings ; and his lordship adds, with the greatest inno- 
cence, that the considerations which principally weigh- 
ed with the commissioners in inducing them not to 
adopt the plan of taxation, was that they undersiood 
the clergy in general to be decidedly averse to it ; so 
that the plan of the commission was, that the greater 
benefices should pay to the little, while the bishops 
themselves — the Archbishop of Canterbury with his 
15,0001. a year, and the Bishop of London with his 
10,000Z. a year — were not to subscribe a single farth- 
ing for that purpose. Why does John, Bishop of Lin- 
coln, mention these distressing schemes of the com- 
mission, which we are certain would have been met 
with a general yell of indignation from one end of the 
kingdom to another ? Surely it must have occurred to 
this excellent prelate that the bishops would have 
been compelled, by mere shame, to have contributed 
to the fund which they were about to put upon the 
backs of the more opulent parochial clergy ; surely a 
moment's reflection must have taught them that the 
safer method by far was to confiscate cathedral pro- 
perty. 

The idea of abandoning this taxation, because it 
was displeasing to the clergy at large, is not unenter- 
taining as applied to a commission who treated the 
clergy with the greatest contempt, and did not even 
notice the communications from cathedral bodies upon 
the subject of the most serious and extensive confisca- 
tions.* 

Spain. If the amiable Lord Glenelg were to leave us, we 
should feel secure in our colonial possessions. If Mr. 
Spring Rice were to go into holy orders, great would he the 
joy of the three per cents. A decent good-looking head of 
the government might easily enough be found in lieu of 
Viscount Melbourne; but in five minutes after the depar- 
ture of Lord John, the whole whig government would he 
dissolved into sparks of liberality and splinters of reform. 
There are six remarkable men, who, in different methods 
and in different degrees, are now affecting the interests of 
this country— the Duke of Wellington, Lord John Russell, 
Lord Brougham, Lord Lyndhurst, Sir Robert Peel, and 
O'Connell. Greater powers than all these are the phlegm 
of the English people— the great mass of good sense and in- 
telligence diffused among them— and the number of those 
who have something to lose, and have not the slightest in- 
tention of losing it. 

* Upon this subject I think it right to introduce the fol- 
lowing letters, the first of which was published January 
23, 1838:— 

TO THE EDITOR OF THE TIMES. 
4 Sir, I feel it to be consistent with my duty, as secretary 
to the church commissioners, to notice a statement emana- 
ting from a quarter which would seem to give it authenticity 



' The plan of taxation, therefore,' says the bishop 
1 being abandoned, it was evident that the funds fof 
the augmentation of poor livings, and for the supply 
of the spiritual wants of populous districts, must be 
drawn from the episcopal and cathedral revenues ; that 
is, from the revenues from which the legislature seems 
to have a peculiar right to draw the funds for the gen- 
eral supply of the religious wants of the people ; be- 
cause they arise from benefices, of which the patro- 
nage is either actually in the crown, or is derivative 
from the crown. In the case of the episcopal reve- 
nues, the commissioners had already carried the prin- 
ciple of redistribution as far as they thought that it 
could, with due allowance for the various demands 
upon the incomes of the bishops, be carried. The on- 
ly remaining source, therefore, was to be found in the 
cathedral revenues : and the commissioners proceeded, 
in the execution of the duties prescribed to them, to 
consider in what manner those revenues might be ren- 
dered conducive to the efficiency of the established 
church.' 

This is very good episcopal reasoning; but is it true? 
The bishops and commissioners wanted a fund to en- 
dow small livings ; they did not touch a farthing of 
their own incomes, only distributed them a little more 
equally ; and proceeded lustily at once to confiscate 



—that, of seven chapter memorials addressed to the hoard, 
the receipt of one was only acknowledged. 

' It is strictly within my province to acknowledge com- 
munications made to the commissioners as a body, either 
directly or through me ; and it is part of their general in- 
structions to me that I should do so in all cases. 

' To whatever extent, therefore, the statement may he 
true, or whatever may he its value, it is clear that it can- 
not attach to the commissioners, hut that I alone am res 
ponsible. 

' In the execution of my office, I have endeavoured, in 
the midst of my other duties, to conduct an extensive cor- 
respondence in accordance to what I knew to he the feel- 
ings and wishes of the commissioners, and to treat every 
party in communication with them with attention and res- 
pect. 

' If, at some period of more than usual pressure, any ac- 
cidental omission may have occurred, or may hereafter oc- 
cur, involving an appearance of discourtesy, it is for me to 
offer, as I now do, explanation and apology. 

< I am, sir, your obedient humble servant, 

< C. K. Murray ' 
'Whitehall Place, Jan. 21.' 

TO THE EDITOR OF THE TIMES. 

t Sir. — A more indiscreet and extraordinary communica- 
tion than that which appears in your own paper of the 23d 
instant, signed by Mr. C. K. Murray, I never read. < Jlpva- 
ret domns intus.' It is now clear how the commission has 
been worked. Where communications from the oldest ec- 
clesiastical bodies, upon the most important of all subjects 
to them and to the kingdom, were received by the greatest 
prelates and noblemen" of the land, acting under the king's 
commission, I should have thought that answers suitable to 
the occasion would, in each case, have been dictated by the 
commission ; that such answers would have been entered 
on the minutes, and read on the board-day next ensuing. 

* Is Mr. C K. Murray quite sure that this, which is done 
at all boards on the most trifling subjects, was not done at 
his board, in the most awful confiscation ever known in 
England ? Is he certain that spoliation was in no instance 
sweetened by civility, and injustice never varnished by 
forms ? Were all the decencies and proprieties, which ought 
to regulate the course of such great bodies, left without a 
single inquiry from the commissioner, to a gentleman who 
seems to have been seized with six distinct fits of oblivion 
on six separate occasions, any one of which required all 
that attention to decorum and that accuracy of memory for 
which secretaries are selected and paid ? 

< According to Mr. C. K. Murray's account, the only or- 
der he received from the board was, " If any prependary 
calls, or any cathedral writes, desiring not to be destroyed, 
just say the communication has been received ;" and even 
this, Mr. Murray tells us, he has not done, and that no one 
of the king's commissioners— archbishops, bishops, mar- 
quises, earls — ever asked him whether he had done it or 
not — though any one of these great people would have 
swooned away at the idea of not answering the most tri- 
fiinar communication from any other of these great people. 

' Whatever else these commissioners do, they had better 
not bring their secretary forward again. They may feel 
wind-bound by public opinion, but they must choose, as a 
sacrifice, a better Iphigenia than Mr. C. K. Murray. 

' Sydkey Smith.' 



SECOND LETTER TO ARCHDEACON SINGLETON. 



281 



cathedral property. But why was it necessary, if the 
fund for small livings was such a paramount conside- 
ration, that the future archbishops of Canterbury 
should be left with two palaces, and 15,000/. per an- 
num ? Why is every future bishop of London to have 
a palace in Fulham, a house in St. James's Square, and 
10,000/. a-year ? Could not all the episcopal functions 
be carried on well and effectually with the half of 
these incomes ? Is it necessary that the Archbishop 
of Canterbury should give feasts to aristocratic Lon- 
don ; and that the domestics of the prelacy should 
.stand with swords and bag- wigs round pig, and turkey, 
and venison, to defend, as it were, the orthodox gas- 
tronome from the fierce Unitarian, the fell Baptist, 
and all the famished children of dissent ? I don't ob- 
ject to all this ; because I am sure that the method of 
prizes and blanks is the best method of supporting a 
church, which must be considered as very slenderly 
endowed, if the whole were equally divided among 
the parishes : but if my opinion were different — if I 
thought the important improvement was to equalize 
preferment in the English church — that such a mea- 
sure was not the one thing foolish, but the one thing 
needful — I should take care, as a mitred commission- 
er, to reduce my own species of preferment to the nar- 
rowest limits, before I proceeded to confiscate the 
property of any other grade of the church. I could 
not as a conscientious man, leave the Archbishop of 
Canterbury with 15,000Z. a-year, and make a fund by 
annihilating residentiaries at Bristol of 500Z. This 
comes of calling a meeting of one species of cattle 
only. The horned cattle say,—' If you want any 
meat, kill the sheep ; don't meddle with us, there is 
no beef to spare.' They said this, however, to the 
lion ; and the cunning animal, after he had gained all 
the information necessary for the destruction of the 
muttons, and learnt how well and widely they pastu- 
red, and how they could be most conveniently eaten 
up, turns round and informs the cattle, who took him 
for their best and tenderest friend, that he means to 
eat them up also. Frequently did Lord John meet the 
destroying bishops ; much did he commend their daily 
heaps of ruins ; sweetly did they smile on each other, 
and much charming talk was there of meteorology 
and catarrh, and the particular cathedral they were 
pulling down at each period ;* till one fine day, the 
home secretary, with a voice more bland, and a look 
more ardently affectionate, than that which the mas- 
culine mouse bestows on his nibbling female, informed 
them that the government meant to take all the 
church property into their own hands, to pay the rates 
out of it, and deliver the residue to the rightful posses- 
sors. Such an effect, they say, was never before pro- 
duced by a coup de theatre. The commission was sepa- 
rated in an instant : London clinched his fist ; Canter- 
bury was hurried out by bis chaplains, and put into a 
warm bed ; a solemn vacancy spread itself over the 
face of Gloucester ; Lincoln was taken out in strong 
hysterics. What a noble scene Serjeant Talfourd 
would have made of this ! Why are such talents 
wasted on Ion and the Athenian Captive ? 

But, after all, what a proposition ! ' You don't 
make the most of your money : I will take your prop- 
erty into my hands, and see if I cannot squeeze a 
penny out of it : you shall be regularly paid all you 
now receive, only if any thing more can be made of it, 
that we will put into our own pockets.' — { Just pull off 
your neckcloth, and lay your head under the guillo- 
tine, and I will promise not to do you any harm : just 
get ready for confiscation ; give up the management of 
all your property ; make us the ostensible managers of 
every thing ; let us be informed of the most minute 
value of all, and depend upon it, we will never injure 
you to the extent of a single farthing.' — ' Let me get 
my arms about you,' says the bear ; < I have not the 
smallest intention of squeezing you.' — ' Trust your fin- 
ger in my mouth,' says the mastiff; ' I will not fetch 
blood.' J 

Where is this to end ? If government are to take 
into their own hands all property which is not manag- 

* < What cathedral are we pulling down to day ?' was 
the standing question at the commission. 



ed with the greatest sharpness and accuracy, they 
may squeeze l-8th per cent, out of the Turkey Compa- 
ny ; Spring Rice would become director of the Hydro- 
impervious Association, and clear a few hundreds for 
the treasury. The British Roasted Apple Society is 
notoriously mismanaged, and Lord John and Brother 
Lister, by a careful selection of fruit, and a judicious 
management of fuel, would soon get it up to par. 

I think, however, I have heard at the Political Econ- 
omy Club, where I have sometimes had the honour of 
being a guest, that no trades should be carried on by 
governments. That they have enough to do of their 
own, without undertaking other persons' business. If 
any savings in the mode of managing ecclesiastical 
leases could be made, great deduction from these sa- 
vings must be allowed for the jobbing and Gaspillage 
of general boards, and all the old servants of the 
church, displaced by this measure, must receive com- 
pensation. 

The whig government, they will be vexed to hear, 
would find a great deal of patronage forced upon them 
by this measure. Their favourite human animal, the 
barrister of six years' standing, would be called into 
action. The whole earth is, in fact, in commission, 
and the human race, saved from the flood, are deliver- 
ed over to barristers of six years' standing. The onus 
probandi now lies upon any man who says he is not a 
commissioner ; the only doubt on seeing a new man 
among the whigs is, not whether he is a commissioner 
or not, but whether it is tithes, poor-laws, boundaries 
of boroughs, church leases, charities, or any of the 
thousand human concerns which are now worked by 
commissioners, to the infinite comfort and satisfaction 
of mankind, who seem in these days to have found out 
the real secret of life — the one thing wanting to sublu- 
nary happiness — the great principle of commission, 
and six years' barristration. 

Then, if there is abetter method of working ecclesi- 
astical estates — if any thing can be gained for the 
church — why is not the church to have it ? why is it 
not applied to church purposes? what right has the 
state to seize it? If I give you an estate, I give it you 
not only in its present state, but I give to you all the 
improvements which can be made upon it — all that 
mechanical, botanical, and chemical knowledge may do 
hereafter for its improvement — all the ameliorations 
which care and experience can suggest, in setting, im- 
proving, and collecting your rents. Can there be such 
miserable equivocation as to say — I leave you your 
property, but I do not leave to you all the improve- 
ments which your own wisdom, or the wisdom of your 
fellow-creatures, will enable you to make of your pro- 
perty? How utterly unworthy of a whig government 
is such a distinction as this ! 

Suppose the same sort of plan had been adopted in 
the reign of Henry VIII., and the legislature had 
said, — You shall enjoy all you now have, but every 
farthing of improved revenue, after this period, shall 
go into the pocket of the state — it would have been 
impossible by this time that the church could have 
existed at all : and why may not such a measure be 
as fatal hereafter to the existence of a church, as it 
would have been to the present generation, if it had 
been brought forward at the time of the Reforma- 
tion? 

There is some safety in dignity. A church is in 
danger when it is degraded. It costs mankind much 
less to destroy it when an institution is associated 
with mean, and not with elevated ideas. I should 
like to see the subject in the hands of H. B. I would 
entitle the print — 

' The Bishops' Saturday Night ; or, Lord John Russell at 

the Pay-Table.' 
The bishops should be standing before the pay-ta- 
ble, and receiving their weekly aUowance ; Lord John 
and Spring Rice counting, ringing, and biting the so- 
vereigns, and the Bishop of Exeter insisting that the 
chancellor of the exchequer had given him one which 
was not weight. Viscount Melbourne, in high chuc- 
kle, should be standing, with his hat on, and his back 
to the fire, delighted with the contest ; and the deans 
and canons should be in the back-ground, waiting till 



WORKS OF THE REV. SIDNEY SMITH. 



their turn came, and the bishops were paid; and 
among them a canon, of large composition, urging 
them on not to give way too much to the bench. 
Perhaps I should add the president of the board of 
trade, recommending the truck principle to the bish- 
ops, and offering to pay them in hassocks, cassocks, 
aprons, shovel-hats, sermon-cases, and such like ec- 
clesiastical gear. 

But the madness and folly of such a measure are in 
the revolutionary feeling which it excites. A govern- 
ment taking into its hands such an immense value of 
property ! What a lesson of violence and change to 
the mass of mankind ! Do you want to accustom 
Englishmen to lose all confidence in the permanence 
of their institutions — to inure them to great acts of 
plunder — and to draw forth all the latent villanies of 
human nature ? The whig leaders are honest men, 
and cannot mean this, but these foolish and inconsis- 
tent measures are the horn-book and infantile lessons 
of revolution; and remember, it requires no great 
time to teach mankind to rob and murder on a great 
scale. 

I am astonished that these ministers neglect the 
common precaution of a foolometer,* with which no 
public man should be unprovided: I mean, the ac- 
quaintance and society of three or four regular British 
fools as a test of public opinion. Every cabinet min- 
ister should judge of all his measures by his foolome- 
ter, as a navigator crowds or shortens sail by the ba- 
rometer in his cabin. I have a very valuable instru- 
ment of that kind myself which I have used for many 
years ; and I would be bound to predict, with the ut- 
most nicety, by the help of this machine, the precise 
effect which any measure would produce upon public 
opinion. Certainly, I never saw any thing so decided 
as the effects produced upon my machine by the rate 
bill. No man who had been accustomed in the small- 
est degree to handle philosophical instruments could 
have doubted of the storm which was coming on, or 
of the thoroughly un-English scheme in which the 
ministry had so rashly engaged themselves. 

I think, also, that it is a very sound argument 
against this measure of church rates, that estates 
have been brought liable to these payments, and that 
they have been deducted from the purchase-money. 
And, what also, if a dissenter were a republican as 
well as a dissenter — a case which has sometimes hap- 
pened ; and what if our anti-monarchial dissenter 
were to object to the expenses of the kingly govern- 
ment ? Are his scruples to be respected, and his tax- 
es diminished, and the queen's privy purse to be sub- 
jected and exposed to the intervening and economical 
squeeze of government commissioners ? 

But these lucubrations upon church rates are an epi- 
sode ; I must go back to John, Bishop of Lincoln. All 
other cathedrals are fixed at four prebendaries; St. 
Paul's and Lincoln having only three, are increased to 
the regulation pattern of four. I call this useless and 
childish. The Bishop of Lincoln says, there were 
more residentiaries before the reformation ; but if for 
three hundred years three residentiaries have been 
found to be sufficient, what a strangely feeble excuse 
it is for adding another, and diverting 3000Z. per annum 
from the small living fund, to say, that there were 
more residentiaries three hundred years ago. 

Must every thing be good and right that is done by 
bishops? Is there one rule of right for them and ano- 
ther for the rest of the world. Now here are two 
commissioners, whose express object is to constitute, 
out of the large emoluments of the dignitaries, a fund 
for the poorer parochial clergy ; and in the very heat 
and fervour of confiscation, they build up two new 



* Mr. Fox very often used to say, < I wonder what Lord 
B. will think of this.' Lord B. happened to be a very stu- 
pid person, and the curiosity of Mr. Fox's friends was nat- 
urally excited to know why he attached such importance 
to the opinion of such an ordinary commonplace person. 
« His opinion,' said Mr. Fox, « is of much more import- 
ance than you are aware of. He is an exact representative 
of all common-place English prejudices, and what Lord B. 
thinks of any measure, the great majority of English peo- 
ple will think of it.' It would be a good thing if every 
cabinet of philosophers had a Lord B. among them. 



places, utterly useless and uncalled for, take 3000?. 
from the charity fund to pay them, and they give the 
patronage of these places to themselves. Is there a 
single epithet in the language of invective which 
would not have been levelled at lay commissioners 
who had attempted the same thing ? If it is necessa- 
ry to do so much for archdeacons, why might not one 
of the residentiaries be archdeacon in virtue of his 
prebend? If government make bishops, they may 
surely be trusted to make archdeacons. I am very 
willing to ascribe good motives to these commission- 
ers, who are really worthy and very sensible men, but 
I am perfectly astonished that they were not deterred 
from such a measure by appearances, and by the mo- 
tives which, whether rightly or wrongly, would be 
imputed to them. In not acting so as to be suspected, 
the Bishop of London should resemble Caesar's wife. 
In other respects, this excellent prelate would not 
have exactly suited for the partner of that great and 
self-willed man ; and an idea strikes me, that it is not 
impossible he might have been in the senate-house 
instead of Caesar. 

Lord John Russell gives himself great credit for not 
having confiscated church property, but merely remo- 
delled and redivided it. I accuse him not of plunder, 
but I accuse him of taking the Church of England, 
rolling it about as a cook does a piece of dough, with 
a rolling pin, cutting a hundred different shapes with' 
all the plastic fertility of a confectioner, and without 
the most distant suspicion that he can ever be wrong, 
or ever be mistaken : with a certainty that he can 
anticipate the consequences of every possible change 
in human affairs. There is not a better man in Eng- 
land than Lord John Russell ; but his worst failure is, 
that he is utterly ignorant of all moral fear ; there is 
nothing he would not undertake. I believe he would 
perform the operation for the stone — build St. Peter's 
— or assume (with or without ten minutes notice) the 
command of the channel fleet ; and no one would dis- 
cover by his manner that the patient had died — the 
church tumbled down — and the channel fleet been 
knocked to atoms. I believe his motives are always 
pure, and his measures often able ; but they are end- 
less, and never done with that pedetenous pace and 
pedetenous mind in which it behoves the wise and 
virtuous improver to walk. He alarms the wise liber- 
als ; and it is impossible to sleep soundly while he 
has the command of the watch.* 

Do not say, my dear Lord John, that I am too se- 
vere upon you. A thousand years have scarce Suffic- 
ed to make our blessed England what it is ; an hour 
may lay it in the dust ; and can you, with all your ta- 
lents, renovate its shattered splendour — can you recall 
back its virtues — can you vanquish time and fate * 
But, alas ! you want to shake the world, and to be 
the thunderer of the scene ! 

Now what is the end of what I have written ? Why 
every body was in a great fright ; and a number of 
bishops, huddled together, and talking of their great 
sacrifices, began to destroy other people's property, 
and to take other people's patronage : and all the 
fright is over now ; and all the bishops are very sorry 
for what they have done, and regret extremely the 
destruction of the cathedral dignitaries, but don't 
know how to get out of the foolish scrape. The whig 
ministry persevere to please Joseph and his brethren, 
and the destroyers ; and the good sense of the matter 
is to fling out the dean and chapter bill, as it now 
stands, and to bring in another next year — making a 
fund out of all the~ non-resident prebends, annexing 
some of the others, and adopting many of the enact- 
ments contained in the present bill. 



* Another peculiarity of the Russells is, that they never 
alter their opinions ; they are an excellent race, but they 
must be trepanned before they can be convinced. 



THIRD LETTER TO ARCHDEACON SINGLETON. 



m 



THIRD LETTER TO ARCHDEACON SINGLE- 
TON. 
My Dear Sir, 

I hope this is the last letter you will receive from 
me on church matters. I am tired of the subject ; so 
is every body. In spite of many bishops' charges, I 
am unbroken ; and remain entirely of the same opinion 
as I was two or three years since — that the mutilation 
of deans and chapters is a rash, foolish, and impru- 
dent measure. 

I do not think the charge of the Bishop of London 
successful, in combating those arguments which have 
been used against the impending dean and chapter 
bill; but it is quiet, gentlemanlike, temperate, and 
written in a manner which entirely becomes the high 
office and character Avhich he bears. 

I agree with him in saying that the plurality and 
residence bill is, upon the whole, a very good bill ; — 
nobody, however, kuows better than the Bishop of 
London the various changes it has undergone, and the 
improvements it has received. I could point out four- 
teen or fifteen material alterations for the better, since 
it came out of the hands of the commission, and all 
bearing materially upon the happiness and comfort of 
the parochial clergy. I will mention only a few : — the 
bill, as originally introduced, gave the bishop a power, 
when he considered the duties of the parish to be im- 
properly performed, to suspend the clergyman and ap- 
point a curate with a salary. Some impious persons 
thought it not impossible that occasionally such a 
power might be maliciously and vindictively exer- 
cised, and that some check to it should be admitted 
into the bill ; accordingly, under the existing act, an 
ecclesiastical jury is to be summoned, and into that 
jury the defendant clergyman may introduce a friend 
of his own. 

If a clergyman, from illness or any other overwhelm- 
ing necessity, was prevented from having two ser- 
vices, he was exposed to an information and penalty. 
In answering the bishop, he was subjected to two op- 
posite sets of penalties — the one for saying yes ; the 
other for saying no : he was amenable to the needless 
and impertinent scrutiny of a rural dean before he was 
exposed to the scrutiny of the bishop. Curates might 
be forced upon him by subscribing parishioners, and 
the certainty of a schism established in the parish: a 
curate might have been forced upon present incum- 
bents by the bishop without any complaint made ; 
upon men who took, or, perhaps, bought their livings 
under very different laws ; all these acts of injustice 
are done away with, but it is not to the credit of the 
framers of the bill that they were ever admitted, and 
they completely justify the opposition with which the 
bill was received by me and by others. I add, how- 
ever, with great pleasure, that when these and other 
objections were made, they were heard with candour, 
and promised to be remedied by the Archbishop of 
Canterbury and the Bishop of London and Lord John 
Russell. 

I have spoken of the power to issue a commission 
to inquire into the well-being of any parish : a vindic- 
tive and malicious bishop might, it is true, convert 
this, which was intended for the protection, to the 
oppression of the clergy — afraid to dispossess a clergy- 
man of his own authority, he might attempt to do the 
same thing under the cover of a jury of his ecclesiasti- 
cal creatures. But I can hardly conceive such base- 
ness in the prelate, or such infamous subserviency in 
the agents. An honest and respectable bishop will 
remember that the very issue of such a commission 
is a serious slur upon the character of a clergyman ; 
he will do all he can to prevent it by private monition 
and remonstrance ; and if driven to such an act of 
power, he will, of course, state to the accused clergy- 
man the subjects of accusation, the names of his ac- 
cusers, and give him ample time for his defence. If, 
upon anonymous accusation, he subjects a clergyman 
to such an investigation, or refuses to him any advan- 
tage which the law gives to every accused person, he 
is an infamous, degraded, and scandalous tyrant: but 
I cannot believe there is such a man to be found upon 
ithe bench. 



There is in this new bill a very humane clause, 
(though not introduced by the commission), enabling 
the widow of the deceased clergyman to retain pos- 
session of the parsonage-house for two months after 
the death of the incumbent. It ought, in fairness, to 
be extended to the heirs, executors, and administra- 
tors of the incumbent. It is a great hardship that a 
family settled in a parish for fifty years, perhaps, 
should be torn up by the roots in eight or ten days ; 
and the interval of two months, allowing time for re- 
pairs, might put to rest many questions of dilapida- 
tion. 

To the bishop's power of intruding a curate, with- 
out any complaint on the part of the parish that the 
duty has been inadequately performed, I retain the 
same objections as before. It is a power which, with- 
out this condition, will be unfairly and partially exer- 
cised. The first object I admit is not the provision of 
the clergyman, but the cure of the parish ; but one 
way of taking care of parishes is to take care that 
clergymen are not treated with tyranny, partiality, 
and injustice ; and the best way of effecting this is to 
remember that their superiors have the same human 
passions as other people, and not to trust them with a 
power which may be so grossly abused, and which 
(incredible as the Bishop of London may deem it), 
has been, in some instances, grossly abused. 

I cannot imagine what the bishop means by saying, 
that the members of cathedrals do not, in virtue of 
their office, bear any part in the parochial instruction 
of the people. This is a fine deceitful word, the word 
parochial, and eminently calculated to coax the pub- 
lic. If he means simply that cathedrals do not belong 
to parishes, that St. Paul's is not the parish church of 
Upper Puddicomb, and that the vicar of St. Fiddlefrid 
does not officiate in Westminster Abbey : all this is 
true enough, but do they not in the most material 
points instruct the people precisely in the same man- 
ner as the parochial clergy ? Are not prayers and 
sermons the most important means of spiritual instruc- 
tion ? And are there not eighteen or twenty services 
in every cathedral for, one which is heard in parish 
churches ? I have very often counted in the after- 
noon of week days in St. Paul's 150 people, and on 
Sundays it is full to suffocation. Is all this to go for 
nothing ? and what right has the Bishop of London to 
suppose that there is not as much real piety in cathe- 
drals, as in the most roadless, postless, melancholy, 
sequestered hamlet preached to by the most provin- 
cial, sequestered bucolic clergyman in the queen's 
dominions ? 

A number of little children, it is true, do not repeat 
a catechism of which they do not comprehend a word ; 
but it is rather rapid and wholesale to say, that the 
parochial clergy are spiritual instructors of the people, 
and that the cathedral clergy are only so in a very re- 
stricted sense. I say that in the most material points 
and acts of instruction, they are much more laborious 
and incessant than any parochial clergy. It might 
really be supposed, from the Bishop of London's rea- 
soning, that some other methods of instruction took 
place in cathedrals than prayers and sermons can 
afford ; that lectures were read on chemistry, or les- 
sons given on dancing ; or that it was a Mechanics' 
Institute, or a vast receptacle for hexameter and pen- 
tameter boys. His own most respectable chaplain, 
who is often there as a member of the body, will tell 
him that the prayers are strictly adhered to, accord- 
ing to the rubric, with the difference only that the 
service is beautifully chanted instead of being badly 
read ; that instead of the atrocious bawling of parish 
churches, the anthems are sung with great taste and 
feeling ; and if the preaching is not good, it is the fault 
of the Bishop of London, who has the whole range of 
London preachers from whom to make his selection. 
The real fact is, that, instead of being something ma- 
terially different from the parochial clergy, as the com- 
missioners wish to make them, the cathedral clergy are 
fellow-labourers with the parochial clergy, outworking 
them ten to one ; but the commission having provided 
snugly for the bishops, have, by the merest accident in 
the world, entangled themselves in this quarrel with 
cathedrals. 



m 

1 Had the question,' says the bishop, ' been proposed 
to the religious part of the community, whether, if no 
other means were to be found, the effective cure of 
souls should be provided for by the total suppression 
of those ecclesiastical corporations which have no 
cure of souls, nor bear any part in the parochial 



labours'of the clergy ; that question, I verily believe 
would have been carried in the affirmative by an im 
mense majority of suffrages.' But suppose no other 
means could be found for the effective cure of souls 
than the suppression of bishops, does the Bishop of 
London imagine that the majority of suffrages would 
have been less immense ? How idle to put such cases. 

A pious man leaves a large sum of money in Catho- 
lic times for some purposes which are superstitious, 
and for others, such as preaching and reading prayers, 
which are applicable to all times; the superstitious 
usages are abolished, the pious usages remain : now 
the bishop must admit, if you take half or any part of 
this money from clergymen to whom it was given, and 
divide it for similar purposes among clergy to whom 
it was not given, you deviate materially from the in- 
tentions of the founder. These foundations are made 
in loco : in many of them the locus was, perhaps, the 
original cause of the gift. A man who founds an alms- 
house at Edmonton does not mean that the poor of 
Tottenham should avail themselves of it ; and if he 
could have anticipated such a consequence, he would 
not have endowed any almshouse at all. Such is the 
respect for property that the Court of Chancery, when 
it becomes impracticable to carry the will of the 
donor into execution, always attend to the cypres, and 
apply the charitable fund to a purpose as germane as 
possible to the intention of the founder; but here, 
when men of Lincoln have left to Lincoln cathedral, 
and men of Hereford to Hereford, the commissioners 
seize it all, melt it into a common mass, and disperse 
it over the kingdom. Surely the Bishop of London 
cannot contend that this is not a greater deviation from 
the will of the founder than if the same people, re- 
maining in the same place, receiving all the founder 
gave them, and doing all things not forbidden by the 
law, which the founder ordered, were to do something 
more than the founder ordered, were to become the 
guardians of education, the counsel to the bishop, 
and the curators of the diocese in his old age and 
decay. 

The public are greater robbers and plunderers than 
any one in the public ; look at the whole transaction ; 
it is a mixture of meanness and violence. The coun- 
try choose to have an established religion, and a resi- 
dent parochial clergy, but they do not choose to build 
houses for their parochial clergy, or pay them in ma- 
ny instances more than a butler or a coachman re- 
ceives. How is this deficiency to be supplied? The 
heads of the church propose to this public to seize upon 
estates which have never belonged to the public, and 
which were left for another purpose ; and by the 
seizure of these estates to save that which ought to 
come out of the public purse. 

Suppose Parliament were to seize upon all the alms- 
houses in England, and apply them to the diminution 
of the poor-rate, what a number of ingenious argu- 
ments might be pressed into the service of this robbe- 
ry : ( Can any thing be more revolting than that the 
poor of Northumberland should be starving while the 
poor of the suburban hamlets are dividing the bene- 
factions of the pious dead? u We want for these 
purposes all we can obtain from whatever sources 
derived." ' I do not deny the right of Parliament 
to do this, or anything else ; but I deny that it 
would be expedient, because I think it better to make 
any sacrifices, and to endure any evil, than to gratify 
this rapacious spirit of plunder and confiscation. Sup- 
pose these commissioner prelates firm and unmoved, 
when we were all alarmed, had told the public that 
the parochial clergy were badly provided for, and that 
it was the duty of that public to provide a proper sup- 
port for their ministers ; — suppose the commissioners, 
instead of leading them on to confiscation, had warned 
their fellow subjects against the base economy and the 

Serilous injustice of seizing on that which was not 
leir own ; — suppose they had called for water and 



WORKS OF THE REV. SIDNEY SMITH. 

washed their hands, and said, ' We call you all to wit- 
ness that we are innocent of this great ruin ;' — does 
the Bishop of London imagine that the prelates who 
made such a stand would have gone down to posterity 
less respected and less revered than those men upon 
whose tomb it must (after all the enumerations of their 
virtues) be written, that under their auspices and by 
their counsels the destruction of the English church be 



gan ? Pity that the Archbishop of Canterbury had 
not retained those feelings, when, at the first meeting 
of bishops, the Bishop of London proposed this holy 
innovation upon cathedrals, and the head of our church 
declared, with vehemence an indignation, that nothing 
in the earth would induce him to consent to it. 

Si mens non loeva fuisset, 
Trojaque nunc stares, Priamique arx alta maneres. 

< But,' says the Lord Bishop of London, < you admit 
the principle of confiscation by proposing the confisca- 
tion and partition of prebends in the possession of non- 
residents. I am thinking of something else, and I sec 
all of a sudden a great blaze of light ; I behold a great 
number of gentlemen in short aprons, neat purple coats, 
and gold buckles, rushing about with torches in their 
hands, calling each other < my lord,' and setting fire to 
ail the rooms in the house, and the people below de- 
lighted with the combustion ; finding it impossible to 
turn them from their purpose, and finding that they 
are all what they are by divine permission ; 1 endea- 
vour to direct their holy innovations into another chan- 
nel ; and I say unto them, ' my lords, had not you 
belter set fire to the out of door offices, to the barns, 
and stables, and spare this fine library, and this noble 
drawing-room ? Yonder are several cow-houses of 
which no use is made ; pray direct your fury against 
them, and leave this beautiful and venerable mansion 
as you found it.' If I address the divinely permitted 
in this manner, has the Bishop of London any right to 
call me a brother incendiary i 

Our. holy innovator, the Bishop of London, has drawn 
a very affecting picture of sheep having no shepherd, 
and of millions who have no spiritual food • our wants, 
he says, are most imperious : even if we were to tax 
large livings, we must still have the money of the ca- 
thedrals : no plea will exempt you, nothing can stop 
us, for the formation of benefices, and the endowment 
of new ones. We want (and he prints it in italics) 
for these purposes < all that we can obtain from what- 
ever source derived.'' I never remember to have been 
more alarmed in my life than by this passage. I said 
to myself, the necessities of the church have got such 
complete hold of the imagination of this energetic 
prelate, who is so captivated by the holiness of his in- 
novations, that all grades and orders of the church 
and all present and future interests will be sacrificed 
to it. I immediately rushed to the acts of Parliament, 
which I always have under my pillow, to see at once 
the worst of what had happened. I found present re- 
venues of the bishops all safe ; that is some comfort, I 
said to myself; Canterbury, 24,000/. or 25,000/. per 
annum; London, 18,000/. or 20,000/. I began to fc< 1 
some comfort : ' things are not so bad ; the bishops do 
not mean to sacrifice to sheep and shepherds' money 
their present revenues ; the Bishop of London is less 
violent and headstrong than I thought he would be.' 
I looked a little further, and found that 15,000/. per 
annum is alloted to the future Archbishop of Canter- 
bury, 10,000/. to the Bishop of London, 8,000/. to Dur- 
ham, and 8,000/. each to Winchester and Ely. ; No- 
thing of sheep and shepherd in all this,' I exclaimed, 
and felt still more comforted. It was not till after the 
bishops were taken care of, and the revenues of the 
cathedrals came into full view, that I saw the perfect 
development ot the sheep and shepherd principle, the 
deep and heartfelt compassion for spiritual labourers, 
and that inward groaning for the destitute state of the 
church, and that firm purpose, printed in italics, of 
taking for these purposes all that could be obtained from 
whatever source derived; and even in this delicious 
rummage of cathedral property, where all the fine 
church feelings of the bishop's heart could be indulged 
without costing the poor sufferer a penny, stalls for 
archdeacons in Lincoln and St. Paul's are, to the 



THIRD LETTER TO ARCHDEACON SINGLETON. 



amount of 2,000/. per annum, taken from the sheep and 
shepherd fund, and the patronage of them divided be- 
tween two commissioners, the Bishop of London, and 
the Bishop of Lincoln, instead of being paid to addi- 
tional labourers in the vineyard. 

Has there been any difficulty, I would ask, in pro- 
curing archdeacons upon the very moderate pay they 
now receive ? Can any clergyman be more thorough- 
ly respectable than the present archdeacons in the see 
of London? but men bearing such an office in the 
church, it may be said, should be highly paid, and 
archbishops, who could very well keep up their digni- 
ty upon 7000Z. per annum, are to be allowed 15,000/. 
I make no objection to all this ; but then what be- 
comes of all these heart-rending phrases of sheep and 
shepherd, and drooping vineyards, and flocks without 
spiritual consolation ? The bishop's argument is, that 
the superfluous must give way to the necessary; but 
in fighting, the bishop should take great care that his 
cannons are not seized, and turned against himself. 
He has awarded to the bishops of England a superflu- 
ity as great as that which he intends to take from the 
cathedrals ; and then, when he legislates for an order 
to which he does not belong, begins to remember the 
distresses of the lower clergy, paints them with all 
the colours of impassioned eloquence, and informs the 
cathedral institutions that he must have every farthing 
he can lay his hand upon. Is not this as if one affected 
powerfully by a charity sermon were to put, his hands 
in another man's pocket, and cast, from what he had 
extracted, a liberal contribution into the plate ? 

I beg not to be mistaken ; I am very far from con- 
sidering the Bishop of London as a sordid and inte- 
rested person ; but this is a complete instance of how 
the best of men deceive themselves, where their inte- 
rests are concerned. I have no doubt the bishop firm- 
ly imagined he was doing his duty ; but there should 
have been men of all grades in the commission, some 
one to say a word for cathedrals and against bishops. 

The bishop says, 'his antagonists have allowed 
three canons to be sufficient for St. Paul's, and, there- 
fore, four must be sufficient for other cathedrals.' 
Sufficient to read the prayers and preach the sermons, 
certainly, and so would one be ; but not sufficient to 
excite, by the hope of increased rank and wealth, ele- 
ven thousand parochial clergy. 

The most important and cogent arguments against 
the dean and chapter confiscations are past over in si- 
lence in the bishop's charge. This, in reasoning, is 
always the wisest and most convenient plan, and Avhich 
all young bishops should imitate after the manner of 
this wary polemic. I object to the confiscation be- 
cause it will throw a great deal more of capital out of the 
parochial church than it will bring into it. I am very 
sorry to come forward with so homely an argument, 
which shocks so many clergymen, and particularly 
those with the largest incomes, and the best bishop- 
rics ; but the truth is, the greater number of clergy- 
men go into the church in order that they may derive 
a comfortable income from the church. Such men in- 
tend to do their duty, and they do it ; but the duty is, 
however, not the motive, but the adjunct. If I was 
writing in gala and parade, I would not hold this lan- 
guage ; but we are in earnest, and on business ; and as 
very rash and hasty changes are founded upon contra- 
ry suppositions of the pure disinterestedness and per- 
fect inattention to temporals in the clergy, we must 
get down at once to the solid rock without heeding how 
we disturb the turf and flowers above. The parochial 
clergy maintain their present decent appearance quite 
as much by their own capital as by the income they 
derive from the church. I will now state the income 
and capital of seven clergymen, taken promiscuously 
in this neighbourhood: — No. 1. Living 200Z., capital 
12,000/. ; No. 2. Living 800., capital 15,000. ; No. 3. 
Living 500Z., capital 12,000. ; No. 4. Living 150/., cap- 
! ital 10,000/. ; No. 5. Living 800/., capital 12,000/. ; No. 
! 6. Living 150., capital 1000/. ; No. 7. Living 600/., ca- 
j pital 16,000/. I have diligently inquired into the cir- 
cumstances of seven Unitarian and Wesleyan ministers, 
j and I question much if the whole seven could make up 
6000/. between them ; and the zeal and enthusiasm of 
• this last division is certainly not inferior to that of the 



former. Now here is a capital of 72,000/, carried into 
the church, which the confiscations of the commission- 
ers would force out of it, by taking away the good 
things which were the temptation to its introduction. 
So that, by the old plan of paying by lottery, instead 
of giving a proper competence to each, not only do 
you obtain a parochial clergy upon much cheaper 
terms ; but, from the gambling propensities of human 
nature, and the irresistible tendency to hope that they 
shall gain the great prizes, you tempt men into your 
service who keep up their credit and yours, not by 
your allowance, but by their own capital; and to de- 
stroy this wise and well-working arrangement, a great 
number of bishops, marquises, and John Russells, are 
huddled into a chamber, and, after proposing a scheme 
which will turn the English church into a collection of 
consecrated beggars, we are informed by the Bishop 
of London that it is an holy innovation. 

I have no manner of doubt, that the immediate ef- 
fect of passing the dean and chapter bill will be, that 
a great number of fathers and uncles, judging, and 
properly judging, that the church is a very altered and 
deteriorated profession, will turn the industry and ca- 
pital of their 'dives into another channel. My friend, 
Robert Eden, says \ this is of the earth earthy :' be it 
so ; I cannot help it, I paint mankind as I find them, 
and am not answerable for their defects. When an 
argument, taken from real life, and the actual condi- 
tion of the world, is brought among the shadowy dis- 
cussions of ecclesiastics, it always occasions terror 
and dismay ; it is like iEneas stepping into Charon's 
boat, which carried only ghosts and spirits. 

Gemuit sub pondere cymba 
Sutilis. 

The whole plan of the Bishop of London is a ptoch- 
ogony— a generation of beggars. He purposes, out of 
the spoils of the cathedral, to create a thousand livings, 
and to give to the thousand clergymen 130/. per an- 
num each : a Christian bishop proposing, in cold blood, 
to create a thousand livings of 130/. per annum each ; 
— to call into existence a thousand of the most unhap- 
py men on the face of the earth, — the sons of the 
poor, without hope, without the assistance of private 
fortune, chained to the soil, ashamed to live with their 
inferiors, unfit for the society of the better classes, 
and dragging about the English curse of poverty, 
without the smallest hope that they can ever shake it 
off. At present, such livings are filled by young men 
who have better hopes — who have reason to expect 
good property — who look forward to a college or a 
family living — who are the sons of men of some sub- 
stance, and hope so to pass on to something better — 
— who exist under the delusion of being hereafter 
deans and prebendaries —who are paid once by mon 
ey, and three times by hope. Will the Bishop of 
London promise to the progeny of any of these thou- 
sand victims of the holy innovation that, if they behave 
well, one of them shall have his butler's place ; ano- 
ther take care of the cedars and hyssops of his garden ? 
Will he take their daughters for his nursery-maids ? 
and may some of the sons of these l labourers of the 
vineyard' hope one day to ride the leaders from St. 
James's to Fulham? Here is hope — here is room for 
ambition — a field for genius, and a ray of ameliora- 
tion ! If these beautiful feelings of compassion are 
throbbing under the cassock of the bishop, he ought, 
in common justice to himseif, to make them known. 

If it were a scheme forgiving ease and independence 
to any large bodies of clergymen, it might be listened 
to ; but the revenues of the English church are such as 
to render this wholly and entirely out of the question. 
If you place a man in a village in the country, require 
that he should be of good manners and well educated; 
that his habits and appearance should be above those 
of the farmers to whom he preaches, if he has nothing 
else to expect (as would be the case in a church of 
equal division) ; and if, upon his village income, he is 
to support a wife and educate a family, without any 
power of making himself known in a remote and soli 
tary situation, such a person ought to receive 500/. per 
annum, and be furnished with a house. There are 
about 10,700 parishes in England and Wales, whose 



WORKS OF THE REV. SIDNEY SMITH. 



average income is 285Z. per annum. Now, to provide 
these incumbents with decent houses, to keep them in 
repair, and to raise the income of the incumbent to 
500Z. per annum, would require (if all the incomes of 
the bishops, deans, and chapters of separate dignita- 
ries, of sinecure rectories, were confiscated, and if the 
excess of all the livings in England above 500Z. per an- 
num were added to them,) a sum of two millions and 
a half in addition to the present income of the whole 
church; and no power on earth could persuade the 
present Parliament of Great Britain to grant a single 
shilling for that purpose. Now, is it possible to pay 
such a church upon any other principle than that of 
unequal division' The proposed pillage of the cathe- 
dral and college churches (omitting all consideration 
of the separate estate of dignitaries) would amount, di- 
vided among all the benefices in England, to about 51. 
12s. 6%d. per man : and this, which would not stop an 
hiatus in a cassock, and would drive out of the paro- 
chial church ten times as much as it brought into it, 
is the panacea for pauperism recommended by her ma- 
jesty's commissioners. 

But if this plan were to drive ^men of capital out of 
the church, and to pauperize the' English clergy, where 
would the harm be ? Could not all the duties of reli- 
gion be performed as well by poor clergymen as by 
men of good substance ? My great and serious appre- 
hension is, that such would not be the case. There 
would be the greatest risk that your clergy would be 
fanatical, and ignorant ; that their habits would be 
low and mean, and that they would be despised. 

Then a picture is drawn of a clergyman with 130Z. 
per annum, who combines all moral, physical, and in- 
tellectual advantages, a learned man, dedicating him- 
self intensely to the care of his parish— of charming 
manners and dignified deportment— six feet two inches 
high, beautifully proportioned, with a magnificent 
countenance, expressive of all the cardinal virtues and 
the Ten Commandments,— and it is asked, with an air 
of triumph, if such a man as this will fall into contempt 
on accouut of his poverty ? But substitute for him an 
average, ordinary, uninteresting minister ; obese, dum- 
py, neithei ill-natured nor good-natured ; neither learn- 
ed nor ignorant, striding over the stiles to church, 
with a second-rate wife — dusty and deliquescent — and 
four parochial children, full of catechism and bread and 
butter ; or let him be seen in one of those Shem-Ham- 
and-Japhet buggies — made on Mount Ararat soon after 
the subsidence of the waters, driving in the High Street 
of Edmonton ;*— among all his pecuniary, saponaceous, 
oleaginous parishioners. Can any man of common 
sense say that all these outward circumstances of the 
ministers of religion have no bearing on religion itself? 

I ask the Bishop of London, a man of honour and 
conscience as he is, if he thinks five years will elapse 
before a second attack is made upon deans and chap- 
ters? Does he think, after reformers have tasted the 
flesh of the church, that they will put up with any oth- 
er diet ? Does he forget that deans and chapters are 
but mock turtle — that more delicious delicacies remain 
behind ? Five years hence he will attempt to make a 
stand, and he wiB. be laughed at and eaten up. In this 
very charge the bishop accuses the lay commissioners 
of another intended attack upon the property of the 
church, contrary to the clearest and most explicit stip- 
ulations (as he says) with the heads of the establish- 
ment. 

Much is said of the conduct of the commissioners, 
but that is of the least possible consequence. They 
may have acted for the best, according to the then ex- 
isting circumstances ; they may seriously have inten- 
ded to do their duty t6 the country ; and I am far from 
saying or thinking they did not ; but without the least 
reference to the commissioners, the question is, Is it 
wise to pass this bill, and to justify such an open and 
tremendous sacrifice of church property ? Does public 
opinion now call for any such measure ? is it a wise 
distribution of the funds of an ill-paid church ? and 

x A. parish which the Bishop of London has the greatest 
desire to divide into little bits ; but which appears quite as 
fit to preserve its integrity as St. James's, St. George's, or 
Kensington, all in the patronage of the bishop. 



will it not force more capital out of the parochial part 
of the church than it brings into it ? If the bill is bad, 
it is surely not to pass out of compliment to the feel- 
ings of the Archbishop of Canterbury. If the pro- 
ject is hasty, it is not to be adopted to gratify the Bi- 
shop of London. The mischief to the church is sure- 
ly a greater evil than the stultification of the commis- 
sioners, &c. If the physician has prescribed hastily, 
is the medicine to be taken to the death or disease of 
the patient ? If the judge has condemned improperly, 
is the criminal to be hung, that the wisdom of the 
magistrate may not be impugned?* 

But why are the commissioners to be stultified by 
the rejection of the measure ? The measure may 
have been very good when it was recommended, ar#d 
very objectionable now. I thought, and many men 
thought, that the church was going to pieces— that 
the affections of the common people were lest to the 
establishment ; and that large sacrifices must be in- 
stantly made, to avert, the effects of this temporary 
madness ; but those days are gone by — and with them 
ought to be put aside measures, which might have been 
wise in those days, but are wise no longer. 

After all, the Archbishop of Canterbury and the 
Bishop of London are good and placable men ; and will 
ere long forget and forgive the successful efforts of 
their enemies in defeating this mis-ecclesiastic law. 

Suppose the commission were now beginning to sit 
for the first time, will any man living say that they 
would make such reports as they have made ? and that 
they would seriously propose such a tremendous revo- 
lution in church property ? And if they would not, 
the inference is irresistible, that to consult the feelings 
of two or three churchmen, we are complimenting 
away the safety of the church. Milton asked where 
the nymphs were when Lycidas perished ? I ask 
where the bishops are when the remorseless deep is 
closing over the head of their beloved establish- 
ment ? f 

You must have read an attack upon me by the Bishop 
of Gloucester, in the course of which he says that I 
have not been appointed to my situation as canon of 
St. Paul's for my piety and learning, but because T am 
a scoffer and a jester.' Is not this rather strong for a 
bishop, and does it not appear to you, Mr. Archdea- 
con, as rather too close an imitation of that language 
which is used in the apostolic occupation of trafficking. 
in fish ? Whether I have been appointed for my pie- 
ty or not, must depend upon what this poor man means 
by piety. He means by that word, of course, a de- 
fence of all the tyrannical and oppressive abuses of 
the church which have been swept away within the 
last fifteen or twenty years of my life ; the corpora- 
tion and test acts ; the penal laws against the Catho- 
lics ; the compulsory marriages of dissenters, and all 
those disabling and disqualifying laws which were the 
disgrace of our church, and which he has always 
looked up to as the consummation of human wisdom.i 
If piety consisted in the defence of these— if it was 
impious to struggle for their abrogation, I have, in-i 
deed, led an ungodly life. 

There is nothing pompous gentlemen are so much! 
afraid of as a little humour. It is like the objection 
of certain cephalic animalculee to the use of small- 
tooth combs,—' Finger and thumb, precipitate pow- 
der, or any thing else you please ; but for Heaven's 
sake no small tooth combs ! ' After all, I believe. 
Bishop Monk has been the cause of much more laugh- 
ter than ever I have been ; I cannot account for it, but 
I never see him enter a room without exciting a smile 
on every countenance within it. , 

Dr. Monk is furious at my attacking the heads oi 
the church ; but how can I help it? If the heads oi 
the church are at the head of the mob ; if I find th< 
best of men doing that which has in all times drawr 
upon the worst enemies of the human race the bitter 



* « After the trouble the commissioners have taken (says 
Sir Robert), after the obloquy they have incurred,' &c. &c 

t What is the use of publishing separate charges, as th< | 
Bishops of Winchester, Oxford, and Rochester have done i 
Why do not the dissentient bishops form into a firm pha i 
lanx to save the church and fling out the bill ? 



LETTER ON THE CHARACTER OP SIR JAMES MACKINTOSH. 



287 



est curses of history, am 1 to stop because the mo- 
tives of these men are pure, and their lives blameless? 
I wish I could find a blot in their lives, or a vice in 
their motives. The whole power of the motion is in 
the character of the movers : feeble friends, false 
friends, and foolish friends, all cease to look upon the 
measure, and say, Would such a measure have been re- 
commended by such men as the prelates of Canterbury 
and London, if it were not for the public advantage? 
and in this way, the great good of a religious estab- 
lishment, now rendered moderate and compatible 
with all men's liberties and rights, is sacrificed to 
names ; and the church destroyed from good breeding 
and etiquette ! the real truth is, that Canterbury and 
London have been frightened — they have overlooked 
the efiect of time and delay — they have been betrayed 
into a fearful and ruinous mistake. Painful as it is to 
teach men who ought to teach us, the legislature 
ought, while there is yet time, to awake and read them 
this lesson. 

It is dangerous for a prelate to write : and whoever 
does it ought to be a very wise one. He has specula- 
ted why I was made a canon of St. Paul's. Suppose 
I were to follow his example, and, going through the 
bench of bishops, were to ask for what reason each 
man had been made a bishop ; suppose I were to go 
into the county of Gloucester, &c. &c.&c. ! ! ! ! ! 

I was afraid the bishop would attribute my promo- 
tion to the Edinburgh Review ; but upon the subject 
of promotion by reviews he preserves an impenetrable 
silence. If my excellent patron, Earl Grey, had any 
reasons of this kind, he may at least be sure that the 
reviews commonly attributed to me were really writ- 
ten by me. I should have considered myself as the 
lowest of created beings to have disguised myself in 
another man's wit, and to have received a reward to 
which I was not entitled.* 

I presume that what has drawn upon me the indigna- 
tion of this prelate, is the observations I have from 
time to time made on the conduct of the commission- 
ers — of which he positively asserts himself to have 
been a member ; but whether he was, or was not a 
member, I utterly acquit him of all possible blame, 
and ot every species of imputation which may attach 
to the conduct of the commissioners. In using that 
word, I have always meant the Archbishop of Canter- 
bury, the Bishop of London, and Lord John Russell ; 
and have, honestly speaking, given no more heed to 
the Bishop of Gloucester than if he had been sitting in 
a commission of Bonzes, in the court of Pekin. 

To read, however, his lordship a lesson of good 
manners, I had prepared for him a chastisement which 
would have been echoed from the Seagrave, who ban- 
taueteth in the castle, to the idiot who spitteth over 
the bridge at Gloucester ; but the following appeal 
struck my eye, and stopped my pen : ' Since that 
;ime, my inadequate qualifications have sustained an 
ippalling diminution, by the affection of my eyes, 
jivhich has impaired my vision, and the progress of 
ivhich threatens to consign me to darkness ; I beg the 
benefit of your prayers to the Father of all mercies, 
hat he will restore me to better use of the visual 
hrgans, to be employed on his service ; or that he will 
nwardly illumine the intellectual vision with a parti- 
hie of that divine ray which his Holy Spirit can alone 
Impart.' 

I It might have been better taste, perhaps, if a mi- 
ked invalid, in describing his bodily infirmities before 
ti church full of clergymen, whose prayers he asked, 
had been a little more sparing in the abuse of his ene- 
mies ; but a good deal must be forgiven to the sick. I 
jvish that every Christian was as well aware as this 
l)Oor bishop of what he needed from divine assistance ; 
|nd in the supplication for the restoration of his sight, 

1*1 understand that the bishop bursts into tears every 
Iiow and then, and says that I have set him the name of 
iiimon, and that all the bishops now call him Simon. Si- 
laon of Gloucester, however, after all, is a real writer, and 
iiow could I know that Dr. Monk's name was the endear- 
ing, though somewhat unmajestic name, of Dick; and if I 
fiad thought about his name at all, I should have called him 
iichaxd of Gloucester. 



and the improvement of his understanding, I must 
fervently and cordially join him. 

I was much amused with what old Hermann* says 
of the Bishop of London's iEschylus. < We find,' he 
says, ' a great arbitrariness of proceeding, and much 
boldness of innovation, guided by no sure principle ; ' 
here it is : qualis ab incepto. He begins with JEschy- 
lus, and ends with the Church of England ; begins with 
profane, and ends with holy innovations — scratching 
out old readings which every commentator had sanc- 
tioned, — abolishing ecclesiastical dignities which 
every reformer had spared ; thrusting an anapest into 
a verse which will not. bear it, — and intruding a canon 
into a cathedral which does not want it ; and this is 
the prelate by whom the proposed reform of the church 
has been principally planned, and to whose practical 
wisdom the legislature is called upon to defer. The 
Bishop of London is a man of very great ability, hu- 
mane, placable, generous, munificent, very agreeable, 
but not to be trusted with great interests where calm- 
ness and judgment are required ; unfortunately, my 
old and amiable school-fellow, the Archbishop of Can- 
terbury, has melted away before him, and sacrificed 
that wisdom on which we all founded our security. 

Much writing and much talking are very tiresome ; 
and, above all, they are so to men who, living in the 
world, arrive at those rapid and just conclusions which 
are only to be made by living in the world. This bill 
passed; every man of sense, acquainted with human 
affairs,' must see, that as far as the church is concerned, 
the thing is at an end. From Lord John Russell, the 
present improver of the church, we shall descend t,o 
Hume, from Hume to Roebuck, and after Roebuck, 
we shall receive our last improvements from Dr. Wade : 
plunder will follow plunder, degradation after degra- 
dation. The church is gone, and what remains is not 
life, but sickness, spasm, and struggle. 

Whatever happens, I am not to blame ; I have fought 
my fight. — Farewell. 

SYDNEY SMITH. 



LETTER ON THE CHARACTER OF SIR JAMES 
MACKINTOSH. 

My Dear Sir, 

You ask for some of your father's letters : I am 
sorry to say I have none to send you. Upon principle, 
I keep no letters except those on business. I have not 
a single letter from him, nor from any human being, in 
my possession. 

The impression which the great talents and amiable 
qualities of your father made upon me, will remain as 
long as I remain. When I turn from living spectacles 
of stupidity, ignorance, and malice, and wish to think 
better of the world — I remember my great and bene- 
volent friend Mackintosh. 

The first points of character which everybody no- 
ticed in him were the total absence of envy, hatred, 
malice, and uncharitableness. He could not hate — he 
did not know how to set about it. The gall-bladder 
was omitted in his composition, and if he could have 
been persuaded into any scheme of revenging himself 
upon an enemy, I am sure (unless he had been nar- 
rowly watched) it would have ended in proclaiming 
the good qualities, and promoting the interests of his 
adversary. Truth had so much more power over him 
than anger, that (whatever might be the provocation) 
he could not misrepresent, nor exaggerate. In ques- 
tions of passion and party, he stated facts as they 
were, and reasoned fairly upon them, placing his hap- 
piness and pride in equitable discrimination. Very 
fond of talking, he heard patiently, and, not averse to 
intellectual display, did not forget that others might 
have the same disposition as himself. 

Till subdued by age and illness, his conversation 
was more brilliant and instructive than that of any 
human being I ever had the good fortune to be ac- 

Ueber die behandlung der Griechischen Dichter bei 
den Englandern Von Gottfried Hermann. WiemaxJahx 
bucher, vol. !iv. 1831. 



WORKS OF THE REV. SIDNEY SMITH. 



nuainted with. His memory (vast and prodigous as I but in this view he was unjust to himself. Still, how- 
it was) he so managed as to make it a source of plea- ever, his style of speaking in Parliament was certain- 
c,™ ™a ir.ctmr.ti™ r*thpr than that rtrp*rifnl pnmnp I lv more acedemic than forensic: it was not sumcient- 



sure and instruction, rather than that dreadful engine 
of colloquial oppression into which it is sometimes 
erected. He remembered things, words, thoughts, 
dates, and every thing that was wanted. His lan- 
guage was beautiful, and might have gone from the 
fireside to the press ; but though his ideas were always 
clothed in beautiful language, the clothes were some- 
times too big for the body, and common thoughts 
were dressed in better and larger apparel than they 
deserved. He certainly had this fault, but it was not 
one of frequent commission. 

He had a method of putting things so mildly and in- 
terrogatively, that he always procured the readiest 
reception for his opinions. Addicted to reasoning in 
the company of able men, he had two valuable habits, 
which are rarely met with in great reasoners — he nev- 
er broke in upon his opponent, and always avoided 
strong and vehement assertions. His reasoning com- 
monly carried conviction, for he was cautious in his 
positions, accurate in his deductions, aimed only at 
truth. The ingenious side was commonly taken by 
some one else ; the interests of truth were protected 
by Mackintosh 

His good-nature and candour betrayed him into a 
morbid habit of eulogizing every body — a habk which 
destroyed the value of commendations, that might 
have been to the young (if more sparingly distribut- 
ed) a reward of virtue and a motive to exertion. Oc- 
casionally he took fits of an opposite nature ; and I 
have seen him abating and dissolving pompous gentle- 
men with the most successful ridicule. He certainly 
had a good deal of humour ; and I remember, 
amongst many other examples of it, that he kept us 
for two or three hours in a roar of laughter, at a din- 
ner-party at his<own house, playing upon the simplic- 
ity of a Scotch cousin, who had mistaken me for my 
gallant synonym, the hero of Acre. I never saw a 
more perfect comedy, nor heard ridicule so long and 
so well sustained. Sir James had not only humour, 
but he had wit also ; at least, new and sudden rela- 
tions of ideas flashed across his mind in reasoning, and 
produced the same effect as wit, and would have been 
called wit, if a sense of their utility and importance 
had not often overpowered the admiration of novelty, 
and entitled them to the higher name of wisdom. 
Then the great thoughts and fine sayings of the great 
men of all ages were intimately present to his recol- 
lection, and came out dazzling and delighting in his 
conversation. Justness of thinking was a strong fea- 
ture in his understanding ; he had a head in which 
nonsense and error could hardly vegetate : it was a 
soil utterly unfit for them. If his display in conversa- 
tion had been only in maintaining splendid paradoxes, 
he would soon have wearied those he lived with ; but 
no man could live long and intimately with your fa- 
ther without finding that he was gaining upon doubt, 
correcting error, enlarging the boundaries, and 
strengthening the foundations of truth. It was worth 
while to listen to a master, whom not himself but na- 
ture had appointed to the office, and who taught what 
it was not easy to forget, by methods which it was 
not easy to resist. 

Curran, the master of the rolls, said to Mr. Grattan, 
1 You would be the greatest man of your age, Grattan, 
if you would buy a few yards of red tape, and tie up 
your bills and papers.' This was the fault or the mis- 
fortune of your excellent father ; he never knew the 
use of red tape, and was utterly unfit for the common 
business of life. That a guinea represented a quanti- 
ty of shillings, and that it would barter for a quantity 
of cloth, he was well aware ; but the accurate number 
of the baser coin, or the just measurement of the man- 
ufactured article, to which he was entitled for his 
gold, he eould never learn, and it was impossible to 
teach him. Hence his life was often an example of 
the ancient and melancholy struggles of genius with 
the difficulties of existence. 

I have often heard Sir James Mackintosh say of 
himself, that he was born to be the professor of an 
university. Happy, and for ages celebrated, would 
have beea the university, which had so possessed him, 



ly more acedemic than 

ly short and quick for a busy and impatient assembly. 
He often spoke over the heads of his hearers— was too 
much in advance of feeling for their sympathies, and 
of reasoning for their comprehension. He began too 
much at the beginning, and went too much to the right 
and left of the question, making rather a lecture or i. 
dissertation than a speech. His voice was bad and 
nasal ; and though nobody was in reality more sin- 
cere, he seemed not only not to feel, but hardly to 
think what he was saying. 

Your father had very little science, and no great 
knowledge of physics. His notions of his early pur- 
suit — the study of medicine— were imperfect and anti- 
quated, and he was but an indifferent classical scholar, 
for the Greek language has never crossed the Tweed 
in any great force. In history, the whole stream of 
time was open before him : he had looked into every 
moral and metaphysical question from Plato to Paley, 
and had waded through morasses of international law, 
where the step of no living man could follow him. Po- 
litical economy is of modern invention ; I am old 
enough to recollect when every judge on the bench 
(Lord Eldon and Serjeant Runnington excepted,) in 
their charges to the grand juries, attributed the then 
high prices of corn to the scandalous combination of 
farmers. Sir James knew what is commonly agreed 
upon by political economists, without taking much 
pleasure in the science, and with a disposition to 
blame the very speculative and metaphysical disqui- 
sitions into which it has wandered, but with a lull 
conviction also (which many able men of his standing 
are without) of the immense importance of the science 
to the welfare of society. 

I think (though, perhaps, some of his friends may 
not agree with me in this opinion) that he was an 
acute judge of character, and of the good as well as 
evil in character. He was, in truth, with the appear- 
ance of distraction and of one occupied with other 
things, a very minute observer of human nature ; and 
I have seen him analyze, to the very springs of the 
heart, men who had not the most distant suspicion of 
the sharpness of his vision, nor a belief that he could 
read any thing but books. 

Sufficient justice has not been done to his political, 
integrity. He was not rich, was from the northern! 
part of the island, possessed great facility of temper, 
and had therefore every excuse for political lubricity, 
which that vice (more common in those days than I 
hope it will ever be again) could possibly require. In- 
vited by every party, upon his arrival from India, he 
remained steadfast to his old friends the whigs, whose 
admission to office, or enjoyment of political power, 
would at that period have'been considered as the most 
visionary of all human speculations ; yet, during his 
lifetime, every body seemed more ready to have for-' 
given the tergiversation of which he was not guilty^ 
than to admire the actual firmness he had displayed; 
With all this he never made the slightest efforts to 
advance his interests with his political friends, never 
mentioned his sacrifices nor his services, expressed no 
resentment at neglect, and was therefore pushed into 
such situations as fall to the lot of the feeble and deli- 
cate in a crowd. 

A high merit in Sir James Mackintosh was his rea 
and unaffected philanthropy. He did not make the 
improvement of the great mass of mankind an engine 
of popularity, and a stepping-stone to power, but ht 
had a genuine love of human happiness. Whatever 
might assuage the angry passious, and arrange th< 
conflicting interests of nations ; whatever could pro- 
mote peace, increase knowledge, extend commerce 
diminish crime, and encourasre industry; whatevei 
could exalt human character, and could enlarge humai 
understanding,— struck at once at the heart of your fa 
ther, and roused all his faculties. I have seen him u 
a moment when this spirit come upon him— like t 
great ship of war— cut his cable, and spread his enor- 
mous canvass, and launch into a wide sea of reasoning 
eloquence. 
But though easily warmed by great schemes of W | 






LETTER TO LORD JOHN RUSSELL. 



nevolence and human improvement, his manner was 
cold to individuals. There was an apparent want of 
heartiness and cordiality. It seemed as if he had 
more affection for the species than for the ingredients 
of which it was composed. He was in reality very 
hospitable, and so fond of company, that he was hard- 
ly happy out of it ; but he did not receive his friends 
with that honest joy which warms more than dinner 
or wine. 

This is the good and evil of your father which comes 
uppermost. If he had been arrogant and grasping ; if 
he had been faithless and false ; if he had been always 
eager to strangle infant genius in its cradle ; always 
ready to betray and to blacken those with whom he 
sat at meat ; he would have passed many men, who, 
in the course of his long life, have passed him ; — but, 
without selling his soul for pottage, if he only had had 
a little more prudence fdr the promotion of his inter- 
ests, and more of angry passions for the punishment 
of those detractors who envied his fame and presum- 
ed upon his sweetness ; if he had been more aware of 
his powers, and of that space which nature intended 
him to occupy, — he would have acted a great part in 
life, and remained a character in history. As it is, he 
has left, in many of the best men in England, and of 
the continent, the deepest admiration of his talents 
his wisdom, his knowledge, and his benevolence. 
I remain, my dear Sir, 

Very truly yours, 

SIDNEY SMITH. 



A LETTER TO LORD JOHN RUSSELL. 

My Lord / 

Though, upon the whole, your residence and plu- 
rality bill is a good bill, and although I think" it (thanks 
to your kind attention to the suggestions of various 
clergymen) a much better bill than that of last year, 
there are still some important defects in it, which de- 
serve amendment and correction. 

Page 13, Sec. 31. — It would seem, from this section, 
that the repairs are to depend upon the will of the 
bishop, and not upon the present law of the land. A 
bishop enters into the house of a non-resident clergy- 
man, and finds it neither papered, nor painted — he 
orders these decorative repairs. In the mean time the 
Court of Queen's Bench have decided that substantial 
repairs only, and not decorative repairs, can be re- 
covered by an incumbent from his predecessor; the 
following words should be added : — ' Provided, always, 
that no other repairs should be required by the bishop, 
than such as any incumbent could recover as dilapi- 
dations from the person preceding him in the. said 
benefice.' 

Page 19, Sec. 42. — Incumbents are to answer ques- 
tions transmitted by the bishop, and these are to be 
countersigned by the rural dean. This is another 
vexation to the numerous catalogue of vexations en- 
tailed upon the rural clergy. Is every man to go be- 
fore the rural dean, twenty or thirty miles off, per- 
haps ? Is he to go through a cross-examination by 
the rural dean, as to the minute circumstances of 
twenty or thirty questions, to enter into reasonings 
upon them, and to produce witnesses? This is a most 
degrading and vexatious enactment, if all this is in- 
tended ; but if the rural dean is to believe the asser- 
tion of every clergyman upon his word only, why may 
not the bishop do so : and what is gained by the enact- 
ment ? But the commissioners seem to have been a 
set of noblemen and gentlemen, who met once a- week, 
to see how they could harass the working clergy, and 
how they could make every thing smooth and pleasing 
to the bishops. 

The clause for holding two livings, at the interval 
of ten miles, is perfectly ridiculous. If you are to 
abolish pluralities, do it at once, or leave a man only 
in possession of such benefices as he can serve him- 
self; and then the distance should be two miles, and 
not a yard more. 

But common justice requires that there should be 
exceptions to your rules. For two hundred years plu- 



ralities within certain distances have been allowed ; 
acting under the faith of these laws, livings have been 
bought and bequeathed to clergymen, tenable- with 
other preferments in their possession — upon faith in 
these laws, men and women have married — educated 
their children — laid down a certain plan of life, and 
adopted a certain rate of expense, and ruin comes 
upon them in a moment, from this thoughtless inatten- 
tion to existing interests. I know a man whose lather 
dedicated all he had saved in a long life of retail trade, 
to purchase the next presentation to a living of 800Z. 
per annum, tenable under the old law, with another of 
oOOl. given to the son by his college. The whole of 
this clergyman's life and prospects (and he has an im- 
mense family of children) are cut to pieces by your 
bill. It is a wrong thing, you will say, to hold two 
livings; I think it is, but why did not you, the legis- 
lature, find this out fifty years ago ? Why did you 
entice this man into the purchase of pluralities, by a 
venerable laxity of two hundred years, and then clap 
him into gaol from the new virtue of yesterday ? Such 
reforms as these make wisdom and carefulness use- 
less, and turn human life into a mere scramble. 

Page 32, Sec. 69. — There are the strongest possible 
objections to this clause. The living is 410Z. per an- 
num, the population above 2000 — perhaps, as is often 
the case, one-third of them dissenters. A clergyman 
does his duty in the most exemplary manner — dedi- 
cates his life to his parish, from whence he derives 
his whole support — there is not the shadow of a com- 
plaint against him. The bishop has, by this clause, 
acquired a right of thrusting a curate upon the rector 
at the expense of a fifth part of his whole fortune. 
This, I think, an abominable piece of tyranny ; audit 
will turn out to be an inexhaustible source of favourit- 
ism and malice. In the bishop's bill I have in vain 
looked for a similar clause — ' That if the population 
is above 800,000, and the income amounts to 10,000Z., 
an assistant to the bishop may be appointed by the 
commissioners, and a salary of 2000Z. per annum 
allotted to him.' This would have been honest and 
manly, to have begun with the great people. 

But mere tyranny and episcopal malice are not the 
only evils of this clause, nor the greatest evils. Every 
body knows the extreme activity of that part of the 
English church which is denominated evangelical, 
and their industry in bringing over every body to their 
habits of thinking and acting ; now see what will hap- 
pen from the following clause : — < And whenever the 
population of any benefice shall amount to 2000, and 
it shall be made appear to the satisfaction of the 
bishop, that a stipend can be provided for the pay- 
ment of a curate, by voluntary contribution or other- 
wise, without charge to the incumbent, it shall be 
lawful for the bishop to require the spiritual person, 
holding the same, to nominate a fit person to be 
licensed as such curate, whatever may be the annual 
value of such benefice ; and if, in either of the said 
cases, a fit person shall not be nominated to the bishop 
within two months after his requisition for that pur- 
pose shall have been delivered to the incumbent, it 
shall be lawful for the bishop to appoint and license a 
curate.' A clause worthy of the Vicar of Wrexhill 
himself. Now what will happen ? The bishop is a 
Calvinistic bishop ; wife, children, chaplains, Calvin- 
ized up to the teeth. The serious people of the parish 
meet together, and agree to give an Hundred pounds 
per annum, if Mr. Wilkinson is appointed. It re- 
quires very little knowledge of human nature to pre- 
dict, that at the expiration" of two months Mr. Wilkin- 
son will be the man ; and then the whole parish is 
torn to pieces with jealousies, quarrels and compari- 
sons between the rector and the delightful Wilkinson. 
The same scene is acted (mutatis mutandis), where 
the bishop sets his face against Calvinistic principles. 
The absurdity consists in suffering the appointment of 
a curate by private subscription ; in other words, one 
clergyman in a parish by nomination, the other by 
election • and, in this way, religion is brought into con- 
tempt by their jealousies and quarrels. Little do you 
know, my dear lord, of the state of that country you 
govern, if you suppose this will not happen. I have 
now a diocese in my eye, where, I am positively cer- 



*90 



WORKS OF THE REV. SIDNEY MITH. 



tain, that in less than six months after the passing of 
the bill, there will not be a single parish of 2000 per- 
sons, in which you will not find a subscription curate, 
of evangelical habits, canting and crowing over the 
regular and established clergymau of the parish. 

In the draft of the fifth report, upon which I presume 
your dean and chapter bill is to be founded, 1 see the 
rights of patronage are to be conceded to present in- 
cumbents. This is very high and honourable conduct 
in the commissioners, and such as deserves the warm- 
est thanks of the clergy ; it is always difficult to re- 
tract, much more difficult to retract to interiors ; but 
it is very virtuous to do so when there can be no 
motive for it but a love of justice. 

Your whole bill is to be one of retrenchment, and 
amputation; why add fresh canons to St. Paul's and 
Lincoln ? Nobody wants them ; the cathedrals go on 
perfectly well without them ; they take away each of 
them 1500/. or 1600/. per annum, from the fund for the 
improvement of small livings ; they give, to be sure, 
a considerable piece of patronage to the Bishops of 
London and Lincoln, who are commissioners, and they 
preserve a childish and pattern-like uniformity in ca- 
thedrals. But the first of these motives is corrupt, 
and the last silly ; and therefore they cannot be your 
motives. 

You cannot plead the recommendation of the com- 
mission for the creation of these new canons, for you 
have flung the commission overboard; and the re- 
formers of the church are no longer archbishops and 
bishops, but Lord John Russell ; — not those persons 
to whom the crown has entrusted the task, but Lord 
Martin Luther, bred and born in our own island, and 
nourished by the Woburn spoils and confiscations of 
the church. The church is not without friends, but 
those friends have said there can be no danger of 
measures which are sanctioned by the highest prelates 
of the church ; but you have chased away the bearers, 
and taken the ark into your own possession. Do not 
forget, however, if you have deviated from the plan of 
your brother commissioners, that you have given to 
them a perfect right to oppose you. 

This unfair and wasteiul creation of new canons, 
produces a great and scandalous injustice to St. Paul's 
and Lincoln, in the distribution of their patronage. 
The old members of all other cathedrals will enjoy the 
benefit of survivorship, till they subside into the magic 
number of four; up to that point, then, every fresh 
death will add to the patronage of the remaining old 
members ; but in the churches of Lincoln and St. Paul's, 
the old members will immediately have one-fifth of 
their patronage taken away by the creation of a fifth 
canon to share it. This injustice and partiality are so 
monstrous, that the two prelates in question will see 
that it is necessary to their own character to apply a 
remedy. Nothing is more easy than to do so. Let 
the bishop's canon have no share in the distribution 
of the patronage, till after the death of all those who 
were residentiaries at the passing of the bill. 

Your dean and chapter bill will, I am afraid, cut 
down the great preferments of the church too much. 

Take for your fund only the non-resident prebends^, 
and leave the number of resident prebends as they 
are, annexing some of them to poor livings with large 
populations. I am sure this is all (besides the aboli- 
tion of pluralities), which ought to be done, and all 
that would be done, if the commissioners were to 
begin de novo from this period, when bishops have re- 
covered from their fright, dissenters shrunk into their 
just dimensions, and the foolish and exaggerated ex- 
pectations from reform have vanished away. The 
great prizes of the church induce men to carry, and 
fathers and uncles to send into the church considerable 
capitals, and in this way enable the clergy to associate 
with gentlemen, and to command that respect which, 
in all countries, and above all in this, depend so much 
on appearances. Your bill, abolishing pluralities, and 
taking away at the same time, so many dignities, 
leaves the church of England so destitute of great 

?rizes, thatj as far as mere emolument has any in- 
uence, it will be better to dispense cheese and butter 
to the public, than to enter into the church. 
There are a<Jmirable men, whose honest and beau- 



tiful zeal carries them into the church without a mo 
ment's thought of its emoluments. Such a man, com- 
bining the manners of a gentleman with the acquire- 
ments of a scholar, and the zeal of an apostle, would 
overawe mercantile grossness, and extort respect from 
insolent opulence ; but lam talking of average vicars, 
mixed natures, and eleven thousand parish priests. If 
you divide the great emoluments of the church into 
little portions, such as butlers and head-game-keepers 
receive, you will very soon degrade materially the 
style and character of the English clergy If I were 
dictator of the church, as Lord Durham is to be of 
Canada, I would preserve the resident, and abolish, 
for the purposes of a fund, the non-resident prebends. 
This is the principal and most important alteration in 
your dean and chapter bfll, which it is not too late to 
make, and for which every temperate and rational 
man ought to strive. 

You will, of course, consider me as a defender of 
abuses. I have all my life been just the contrary, and 
I remember, with pleasure, thirty years ago, old Lord 
Stowell saying to me, ' Mr. Smith, you would have 
been a much richer man if you had joined us.' I like, 
my dear lord, the road you are travelling, but I don't 
like the pace you are driving ; too similar to that of 
the son of Nimshi. I always feel myself inclined to 
cry out, Gently, John, gently down hill. Put on the 
drag. We shall be over, if you go so quick — you'll do 
us a mischief. 

Remember, as a philosopher, that the Church of 
England now is a very different institution from what 
it was twenty years ago. It then oppressed every sect ; 
and the only real cause of complaint for dissenters is, 
that they can no longer find a grievance, and enjoy the 
distinction of being persecuted. I have always tried 
to reduce them to this state, and I do not pity them. 

You have expressed your intention of going beyond 
the fifth report, and limiting deans to 2000/. per annum, 
canons to 1000Z. This is, I presume, in conformity 
with the treatment of the bishops, who are limited to 
from 4500/., to 5000/. per annum ; and it wears a fine 
appearance of impartial justice ; but for the dean and 
canon the sum is a maximum — in bishops it is a max 
imum and minimum too ; a bishop cannot have less 
than 3500/., a canon may have as little as the poverty 
of his church dooms him to, but he cannot have more 
than 1000/. ; but there are many canonries of 500/., or 
600/., or 700/. per annum, and a few only of 1000/.; 
many deaneries of from 1000/. to 1500/. per annum : 
and only a very few above 2000/. If you mean to 
make the world believe that you are legislating for 
men without votes, as benevolently as you did for 
those who have votes in Parliament, you should make 
up the allowance of every canon to 1000/., and of every 
dean to 2000/. per annum, or leave them to the pre- 
sent lottery of blanks and prizes. Besides, too, do I 
not recollect some remarkable instances, in your bish- 
ops' act, of deviation from this rigid standard of epis- 
copal wealth? Are not the archbishops to have the 
enormous sums of 15,000/. and 12,000/. per annum? is 
not the Bishop of London to have 10,000/. per annum? 
Are not all these three prelates commissioners ? And 
is not the reason alleged for the enormous income of 
the Bishop of London, that every thing is so expen- 
sive in the metropolis ? Do not the deans of St. Paul's 
and Westminster, then, live in London also? And 
can the Bishop of London sit in his place in the 
House of Lords, and not urge for those dignita- 
ries the same reasons which were so successful in 
securing such ample emoluments for his own see ? My 
old friend, the Bishop of Durham, has 8000Z. per annum 
secured to him. I am heartily glad of it ; what possi- 
ble reason can there be for giving him more than other 
bishops, and not giving to the Dean of Durham more 
than other deans ? that is, of leaving him one half of his 
present income. It is impossible this can be a clap- 
trap for Joseph Hume, or a set-off against the disasters 
of Canada ; you are too honest and elevated for this. I 
cannot comprehend what is meant by such gross par- 
tiality and injustice. 

Why are the economists so eagerly in the field ? The 
public do not contribute one halfpenny to the support 
of deans and chapters ; it is not proposed by any on© 



SERMON ON THE DUTIES OF THE QUEEN. 



291 



to confiscate the revenues of the church ; the whole is 
a question of distribution, in what way the revenues of 
the church can be best administered for the public 
good. But whatever may be the respective shares of 
Peter or Paul, the public will neve'r be richer or poorer 
by one shilling. 

When your dean and chapter bill is printed, I shall 
take the. liberty of addressing you again. The clergy 
naturally look with the greatest anxiety to these two 
bills ; they think that you will avail yourself of this 
opportunity, to punish them for their opposition to 
your government in the last elections. They are 
afraid that your object is not so much to do good as 
to gratify your vanity, by obtaining the character of a 
great reformer, and that (now the bishops are provided 
for) you will varnish over your political mistakes by 
increased severity against the church, or, apparently 
struggling for their good, see with inexpressible de 
light the ciergy delivered over to the tender mercies of 
the radicals. These are the terrors of the clergy. 
judge you with a very different judgment. You are a 
religious man , not unfriendly to the church ; and but 
for that most foolish and fatal error of the church rates 
(into which you were led by a man who knows no more 
of England than of Mesopotamia), I believe you would 
have gone on well with the church to the last. There 
is a genius in action, as well as diction ; and because 
you see political evils clearly, and attack them bravely 
and cure them wisely, you are a man of real genius 
and are most deservedly looked up to as the leader of 
the whig party in this kingdom. I wish, I must con 
fess, you were rather less afraid of Joseph and Dan 
iel ; but God has given you a fine understanding, and a 
fine character ; and I have so much confidence in your 
spirit and honour, that I am sure you would rather 
abandon your bills altogether, than suffer the enemies 
of the church to convert them into an engine of spoil 
and oppression. I am, &c. 

. SYDNEY SMITH. 



SERMON ON THE DUTIES OF THE QUEEN. 
Daniel, iv. 31. 

'OH KING, THY GLOKY IS DEPARTED FROM THEE.' 

I do not think I am getting out of the fair line of du 
ty of a minister of the gospel, if, at the beginning of a 
new reign, I take a short review of the moral and re- 
ligious state of the country ; and point out what those 
topics are which deserve the most serious considera- 
tion of a wise and a Christian people. 

The death of a king is always an awful lesson to 
mankind; and it produces a more solemn pause, and 
-creates more profound reflection than the best lessons 
of the best teachers. 

From the throne to the tomb — wealth, splendour, 
flattery, all gone ! The look of favour — the voice of 
power, no more ; — the deserted palace — the wretched 
monarch on his funeral bier — the mourners ready — 
the dismal march of death prepared. Who are we, 
and what are we? and for what has God made us? 
and why are we doomed to this frail and unquiet ex- 
istence ? Who does not feel all this ? in whose heart 
does it not provoke appeal to and dependence on God ? 
before whose eyes does it not bring the folly and the 
nothingness of all things human ? 

But a good king must not go to his grave without 
that reverence from the people which his virtues de- 
served. And I will state to you what those virtues 
were, state it to you honestly and fairly ; for I should 
heartily despise myself, if from this chair of truth I 
would utter one word of panegyric of the great men of 
the earth, which I could not aver before the throne of 
God. 

The late monarch, whose loss we have to deplore, 
was sincere and honest in his political relations ; he 
put his trust really where he put his trust ostensibly 
— and did not attempt to undermine, by secret means, 
those to whom he trusted publicly the conduct of af- 
fairs ; and I must beg to remind you that no vice and 
no virtue are indifferent in a monach ; human beings 
are very imitative ; there is a fashion in the higher 



I qualities of our minds, as there is in the iesser consi- 
derations of life. It is by no means indifferent to the 
I morals of the people at large, whether a tricking per- 
fidious king is placed on the throne of these realms, 
or whether the sceptre is swayed by one of plain and 
manly character, walking ever in a straight line, on 
the firm ground of truth, under the searching eye of 
j God. 

The late king was of a sweet and Christian disposi- 
' tion ; he did not treasure up little animosities, and in- 
j dulge in vindictive feelings ; he had no enemies but 
j the enemies of the country ; he did not make the me- 
| mory of a king a fountain of wrath ; the feelings of 
; the individual (where they required any control) were 
in perfect subjection to the just conception he had 
formed of his high duties ; and every one near him 
found it was a government of principle and not of tem- 
per ; not of caprice, not of malice couching in high 
places, and watching an opportunity of springing on 
its victim. 

Our late monarch had the good nature of Christian- 
ity ; he loved the happiness of all the individuals 
about him, and never lost an opportunity of promoting 
it ; and where the heart is good and the mind active, 
and the means ample, this makes a luminous and 
beautiful life, which gladdens the nations, and leads 
them, and turns men to the exercise of virtue, and the 
great work of salvation. 

We may honestly say of our late sovereign that he 
loved his country, and was sensibly alive to its glory 
and happiness. When he entered into his palaces he 
did not say 'All this is my birthright; I am entitled 
to it — it is my due — how can I gain more splendour? 
how can I increase all the pleasures of the senses V 
but he looked upon all as a memorial that he was 
to repay by example, by attention, and by watchful- 
ness over the public interests, the affectionate and la- 
vish expenditure of his subjects; and this was not a 
decision of reason, but a feeling, which hurried him 
away. Whenever it was pointed out to him that 
England could be made more rich, or more hap- 
py, or rise higher in the scale of nations, or be 
better guided in the straight path of the Christi- 
an faith, on all such occasions he rose above him- 
self; there was a warmth and a truth, and an honesty, 
which it was impossible to mistake ; the gates of his 
heart were flung open, and the heart throbbed and 
beat for the land which his ancestors had rescued 
from slavery, and governed with justice : — but he is 
gone — and let fools praise conquerors, and say the 
great Napoleon pulled down this kingdom and destroy- 
ed that army, we will thank God for a king who has 
derived his quiet glory from the peace of his realm, 
and who has founded his own happiness upon the 
happiness of his people. 

But the world passes on, and a new order of things 
arises. Let us take a short view of those duties 
which devolve upon the young queen, whom Provi- 
dence has placed over us — what ideas she ought to 
form of her duties — and on what points she should en- 
deavour to place the glories of her reign. 

First and foremost, I think, the new queen should 
bend her mind to the very serious consideration of 
educating the people. Of the importance of this, I 
think no reasonable doubt can exist ; it does not, in 
its effects, keep pace with the exaggerated expecta- 
tions of its injudicious advocates, but it presents the 
best chance of national improvement. 

Reading and writing are mere increase of power. 
They may be turned, I admit, to a good, or a bad pur- 
pose ; but for several years of his life the child is in 
your hands, and you may give to that power what 
bias you please : thou shalt not kill — thou shalt not 
steal — thou shalt not bear false witness ; — by how ma- 
ny fables, by how much poetry, by how many beauti- 
ful aids of imagination, may not the fine morality of 
the Sacred Scriptures be engraven on the minds of the 
young ? I believe the arm of the assassin may be of- 
ten stayed by the lessors of his early life. When I 
see the village school, and the tattered scholars, and 
the aged master or mistress teaching the mechanical 
art of reading or writing, and thinking that they are 
teaching that alone, and feel that the aged instructor 



WORKS OF THE REV. SIDNEY SMITH. 



is protecting life, insuring property, fencing the altar, 
guarding the throne, giving space and liberty to all 
the fine powers of man, and lifting him up to his own 
place in the order of creation. 

There are, I am sorry to say, many countries in 
Europe, which have taken the lead of England in the 
great business of education, and it is a thoroughly 
commendable and legitimate object of ambition in a 
sovereign to overtake them. The names, too, of mal- 
efactors, and the nature of their crimes are subjected 
to the sovereign ; — how is it possible that a sovereign, 
with the fine feelings of youth, and with all tbe gen- 
tleness of her sex, should not ask herself, whether the 
human being whom she dooms to death, or at least 
does not rescue from death, has been properly warned 
in early youth of the horrors of that crime for which 
his life is forfeited ? — ' Did he ever receive any educa- 
tion at all ? — did a father and mother watch over him ? 
— was he brought to places of worship? — was the 
Word of God explained to him? — was the book of 
knoAvledge opened to him? — Or am I, the fountain of 
mercy, the nursing-mother of my people, to send a 
forsaken wretch from the streets to the scaffold, and 
to prevent, by unprincipled cruelty, the evils of un- 
principled neglect V 

Many of the objections found against the general 
education of the people are utterly untenable ; where 
all are educated, education cannot be a source of dis- 
tinction, and a subject for pride. The great source of 
labour is want ; and as long as the necessities of life 
call for labour — labour is sure to be supplied. All 
these fears are foolish and imaginary ; the great use 
and the great importance of education properly con- 
ducted are, that it creates a great bias iu favour of 
•virtue and religion, at a period of life when the mind 
is open to all the impressions which superior Avisdom 
may choose to affix upon it ; the sum and mass of 
these tendencies and inclinations make a good and vir- 
tuous people, and draw down upon us the blessing 
and protection of Almighty God. 

A second great object which I hope will be impress- 
ed upon the mind of this royal lady is, a rooted horror 
of war — an earnest and passionate desire to keep her 
people in a state of profound peace. The greatest 
curse which can be entailed upon mankind is a state of 
war. All the atrocious crimes committed in years of 
peace — all that is spent in peace by the secret corrup- 
tions, or by the thoughtless extravagance of nations, 
are mere trifles compared with the gigantic evils which 
stalk over the world in a state of war. God is forgot- 
ten in war — every principle of Christian charity tram- 
pled upon — human labour destroyed — human industry 
extinguished ; — you see the son and the husband and 
the brother dying miserably in distant lands — you see 
the waste of human affections — you see the breaking 
of human hearts — you hear the shrieks of widows and 
children after the battle — and you walk over the man- 
gled bodies of the wounded calling for death. I would 
say to that royal child, worship God, by loving peace 
— it is not your humanity to pity a beggar by giving 
him food or raiment — I can do that ; that is the chari- 
ty of the humble, and the unknown — widen you your 
heart for the more expanded miseries of mankind — pity 
the mothers of the peasantry who see their sons torn 
away from their families — pity your poor subjects 
crowded into hospitals, and calling in their last breath 
upon their distant country and their young queen — pity 
the stupid, frantic folly of human beings who are al- 
ways ready to tear each other to pieces, and to deluge 
the earth with each other's blood ; this is your extend- 
ed humanity — and this the great field of your compas- 
sion. Extinguish in your heart the fiendish love of 
military glory, from which your sex does not necessa- 
rily exempt you, and to which the wickedness of flat- 
terers may urge you. Say upon your death-bed, ' I 
have made few orphans in my reign — I have made few 
widows — my object has been peace. I have used all 
the weight of my character, and all the power of my 
situation, to check the irascible passions of mankind, 
and to turn them to the arts of honest industry . this 
has been the Christianity of my throne, and this the 
Gospel of my sceptre ; in this way I have strove to 
worship my Redeemer and my Judge.' 



I I would add (if any addition were wanted as a part 
of the lesson to youthful royalty) , the utter folly of all 
wars of ambition, where the object sought for — if at- 
tained at all — is commonly attained at manifold its 
real value, and often wrested, after short enjoyment, 
from its possessor, by the combined indignation and 
just vengeance of the other nations of the world. It is 
all misery, and folly, and impiety, and cruelty. The 
atrocities, and horrors, and disgusts of war, have nev- 
er been half enough insisted upon by the teachers of 
the people ; but the worst of evils and the greatest of 
follies, have been varnished over with specious names, 
and the gigantic robbers and murderers of the world 
have been holden up, for their imitation, to the weak 
eyes of youth. May honest counsellors keep this poi- 
son from the mind of the young queen. May she love 
what God bjds, and do what makes men happy ! 

I hope the queen will love the national church, and 
protect it ; but it must be impressed upon her mind, 
that every sect of Christians have as perfect a right to 
the free exercise of their worship as "the church itself 
— that there must be no invasion of the privileges of 
other sects, and no contemptuous disrespect of their 
feelings— that the altar is the very ark and citadel of 
freedom. 

Some persons represent old age as miserable, be 
cause it brings with it the pains and infirmities of the 
body : but what gratification to the mind may not old 
age bring with it in this country of wise and rational 
improvement ? I have lived to see the immense im- 
provements of the Church of England ; all its powers 
of persecution destroyed — its monopoly of civil offices 
expunged from the book of the law, and all its unjust 
and exclusive immunities levelled to the ground. The 
Church of England is now a rational object of love and 
admiration — it is perfectly compatible with civil free- 
dom — it is an institution for worshipping God, and not 
a cover for gratifying secular insolence, and minister- 
ing to secular ambition. It will be the duty of those 
to whom the sacred trust of instructing our youthful 
queen is intrusted, to lead her attention to these great 
improvements in our religious establishments ; and to 
show to her how possible, and how wise it is, to render 
the solid advantages of a national church compatible 
with the civil rights of those who cannot assent to its 
doctrines. 

Then again, our youthful ruler must be very slow to 
believe all the exaggerated and violent abuse which 
religious sects indulge in against each other. She will 
find, for instance, that the Catholics, the great object 
of our horror and aversion, have (mistaken as they are) 
a great deal more to say in defence of their tenets than 
those imagine who indulge more in the luxury of invec- 
tive than in the labour of inquiry— she will find in that 
sect, men as enlightened, talents as splendid, and pro- 
bity as firm, as in our own church ; and she will soon 
learn to appreciate, at its just value, that exaggerated 
hatred of sects which paints the Catholic faith (the re- 
ligion of two-thirds of Europe) as utterly incompatible 
with the safety, peace, and order of the world. 

It will be a sad vexation to all loyal hearts and to 
all rationally pious minds, if our sovereign should fall 
into the common error of mistaking fanaticism for re- 
ligion ; and in this way fling an air of discredit upon 
real devotion. It is, I am afraid, unquestionably the 
fault of the age ; her youth and her sex do not make it 
more improbable, and the warmest efforts of that de- 
scription of persons will not be wanting to gain over a 
convert so illustrious and so important. Should this 
take place, the consequences will be serious and dis- 
tressing — the land will be inundated with hypocrisy — 
absurdity will be heaped upon absurdity — there will be 
a race of folly and extravagance for royal favour, and 
he who is farthest removed from reason will make the 
nearest approach to distinction ; and then follow the 
usual consequences; a weariness and disgust of reli- 
gion itself, and the foundation laid for an age of impi- 
ety and infidelity. Those, then, to whom these mat- 
ters are delegated, will watch carefully over every 
sign of this excess, and guard from the mischievous 
intemperance of enthusiasm those feelings and that 
understanding, the healthy state of which bears so 



THE LAWYER THAT TEMPTED CHRIST. 



strongly and intimately upon the happiness of a whole 
people. 

Though I deprecate the bad effects of fanaticism, I 
earnestly pray that our young sovereign may evince 
nerself to be a person of deep religious feeling : what 
other cure has she for all the arrogance and vanity 
which her exalted position must engender ? for all the 
flattery and falsehood with which she must be sur- 
rounded ? for all the soul-corrupting homage with 
which she is met at every moment of her existence ? 
what other cure than to cast herself down in darkness 
and solitude before God — to say that she is dust and 
ashes — and to call down the pity of the Almighty upon 
her difficult and dangerous life '. This is the antidote 
of kings against the slavery and the baseness which 
surround them— they should think often of death— and 
the folly and nothingness of the world, and they should 
humble their souls before the Master of masters, and 
the King of kings ; praying to Heaven for wisdom and 
calm reflection, and for that spirit of Christian gentle- 
ness which exalts command into an empire of justice, 
and turns obedience into a service of love. 

A wise man struggling with adversity is said by 
some heathen writer to be a spectacle on which the 
gods might look down with pleasure — but where is 
there a finer moral and religious picture, or one more 
deserving of divine favour, than that of which, per- 
haps, we are now beginning to enjoy the blessed real- 
ity? 

A young queen, at that period of life which is com- 
monly given up to frivolous amusement, sees at once 
the great principles by which she should be guided, 
and steps at once into the great duties of her station. 
The importance of educating the lower orders of the 
people is never absent from her mind ; she takes up 
this principle at the beginning of her life, and in all the 
change of servants, and in all the struggle of parties, 
looks to it as a source of permanent improvement = A 
great object of her affections is the preservation of | 
peace ; she regards a state of war as the greatest of all 
human evils, thinks that the lust of conquest is not a 
glory but a bad crime ; despises the folly and miscal- 
culations of war, and is willing to sacrifice every thing 
to peace, but the clear honour of her land. 

The patriot queen, whom I am painting, reverences 
the national church — frequents its worship, and regu- 
lates her faith by its precepts ; but she withstands the 
encroachments, and keeps down the ambition natural 
to establishments, and, by rendering the privileges of 
the church compatible with the civil freedom of all 
sects, confers strength upon, and adds duration to, 
that wise and magnificent institution. And then this 
youthful monarch, profoundly but wisely religious, dis- 
daining hypocrisy, and far above the childish follies of 
false piety, casts herself upon God, and seeks from the 
Gospel of his blessed Son a path for her steps and a 
comfort for her soul. Here is a picture which warms 
every English heart, and would bring all this congre- 
gation upon their bended knees before Almighty God 
to pray it may be realized. What limits to the glory 
and happiness of our native land, if the Creator should 
in his mercy have placed in the heart of this royal 
woman the rudiments of wisdom and mercy ; and if, 
giving them time to expand, and to bless our children's 
children with her goodness, He should grant to her a 
long sojourning upon earth, and leave her to reign over 
us till she is well stricken in years? What glory ! 
what happiness ! what joy ! what bounty of God ! I 
of course can only expect to see the beginning of such 
a splendid period ; but when I do see it, I shall ex- 
claim with the Psalmist, — l Lord, now lettest thou thy 
servant depart in peace, for mine eyes have seen thy 
salvation.' 



THE LAWYER THAT TEMPTED CHRIST. 

A SERMON ; 

Preached in the Cathedral Church at St. Peter, York, 
before the Hon. Sir John Bayley ; Knt., one of his 
Majesty's Justices of the Court of King's Bench, and 
the Hon. Sir JohnHullock, Knt., one of his Majesty's 
Barons of the Court of Exchequer, August 1, 1824. 

Luke x. 25. 
'and behold, a certain lawyer stood up, and tempted 
him, saying, " master, what shall i do to inherit 
eternal life?'" 

This lawyer, who is thus represented to have tempted 
our blessed Saviour, does not seem to have been very 
much in earnest in the question which he asked ; his 
object does not appear to have been the acquisition of 
religious knowledge, but the display of human talent. 
He did not say to himself, I will now draw near to this 
august being ; I will inform myself from the fountain 
of truth, and from the very lips of Christ ; I will learn 
a lesson of salvation ; but it occurred to him, that in 
such a gathering together of the Jews, in such a mo- 
ment of public agitation, the opportunity of display 
was not to be neglected : full of that internal confi- 
dence which men of talents so ready, and so exercised, 
are sometimes apt to feel, he approaches our Saviour 
with all the apparent modesty of interrogation, and, 
saluting him with the appellation of Master, prepares, 
with all professional acuteness, for his humiliation and 
defeat. 

Talking humanly, and we must talk humanly, for 
our Saviour was then acting an human part, the ex- 
periment ended, as all must wish an experiment to 
end, where levity andfbad faith are on one side, and 
piety, simplicity and goodness on the other : the ob- 
jector was silenced, and one of the brightest lessons of 
the Gospel elicited, for the eternal improvement of 
mankind. 

Still, though we wish the motive for the question 
had been better, we must not forget the question, and 
we must not forget who asked the question, and we 
must not forget who answered it, and what the an- 
swer was. The question was the wisest and best that 
ever came from the mouth of man ; the man who asked 
it was the very person who ought to have asked it; a 
man overwhelmed, probably, with the intrigues, the 
bustle, and business of life, and, therefore, most likely 
to forget the interests of another world : the answerer 
was our blessed Saviour, through whose mediation, 
you, and I, and all of us, hope to live again, and the 
answer, remember, was plain and practical; not flow- 
ery, not metaphysical, not doctrinal ; but it said to 
the man of the law, if you wish to live eternally, do 
your duty to God and man ; live in this world as you 
ought to live ; make yourself fit for eternity ; and 
then, and then only, God will grant to you eternal 
life. 

There are, probably, in this church, many persons 
of the profession of the law, who have often asked be- 
fore, with better faith than their brother, and who do 
now ask this great question, < What shall I do to in- 
herit eternal life V I shall, therefore, direct to them 
some observations on the particular duties they owe 
to society, because I think it suitable to this particu- 
lar season, because it is of much more importance to 
tell men how they are to be Christians in detail, than 
to exhort them to be Christians generally ; because it 
is of the highest utility to avail ourselves of these oc- 
casions to show to classes of mankind what those vir- 
tues are, which they have more frequent and valuable 
opportunities of practising, and what those faults and 
vices are to which they are more particularly exposed. 

It falls to the lot ol those who are engaged in the 
active and arduous profession of the law to pass their 
lives in great cities, amidst severe and incessant occu- - 
pation, requiring all the faculties, and calling forth, 
from time to time, many of the strongest passions of 
our nature. In the midst of all this, rivals are to be 
watched, superiors are to be cultivated, connections 
cherished: some portion of life must be given to soci- 
ety, and some little to relaxation and amusement. 



394 



WORKS OF THE REV. SIDNEY SMITH. 



When, then, is the question to he asked, ' What shall 
I do to inherit eternal life?' what leisure for the altar, 
what time for God ? I appeal to the experience of 
men engaged in this profession, whether religious 
feelings and religious practices are not, without any- 
speculative disbelief, perpetually sacrificed to the bu- 
siness of the world. Are not the habits of devotion 
gradually displaced by other habits of solicitude, hur- 
ry, and care, totally incompatible with habits of devo- 
tion ? It not the taste for devotion lessened ? Is not 
the time for devotion abridged? Are you not more 
and more conquered against your warnings and 
against your will, not, perhaps, without pain and 
compunction, by the mammon of life ? and what is the 
cure for this great evil to which your profession expo- 
ses you ? The cure is, to keep a sacred place in your 
heart, where Almighty God is enshrined, and where 
nothing human can enter ; to say to the world, ' Thus 
far shait thou go, and no farther ;' to remember you 
are a lawyer, without forgetting you are a Christian ; 
to wish for no more wealth than ought to be possess- 
ed by an inheritor of the kingdom of heaven ; to covet 
no more honour than is suitable to a child of God ; 
boldly and bravely to set yourself limits, and to show 
to others you have limits, and that no professional ea- 
gerness and no professional activity shall ever induce 
you to infringe upon the rules and practices of religion : 
remember the text : put the great question really, 
which the tempter of Christ only pretended to put. 
In the midst of your highest success, in the most per- 
fect gratification of your vanity, in the most ample 
increase of your wealth, fall down at the feet of Jesus, 
and say, ' Master, what shall I do to inherit eternal 
life?' 

The genuine and unaffected piety of a lawyer is, in 
one respect, of great advantage to the general inte- 
rests of religion ; inasmuch as to the highest member 
of that profession a great share of church patronage 
is entrusted, and to him we are accustomed to look up 
in the senate, for the defence of our venerable estab- 
lishment ; and great and momentous would be the loss 
to this nation, if any one, called to so high and hon- 
ourable an office, were found deficient in this an- 
cient, pious, and useful zeal for the established church. 
In talking to men of your active lives and habits, is it 
not possible to anticipate the splendid and exalted sta- 
tions for which any one of you maybe destined. Fifty 
years ago, the person at the head of his profession, 
the greatest lawyer now in England, perhaps in the 
world, stood in this church, on such occasions as the 
present, as obscure, as unknown, and as much doubt- 
ing of his future prospects, as the humblest individual 
of the profession here present. If Providence reserve 
such honours for any one who may now chance to hear 
me, let him remember that there is required at his 
hands a zeal for the established church, but a zeal 
tempered by discretion, compatible with Christian 
charity, and tolerant of Christian freedom. All hu- 
man establishments are liable to err, and are capable 
of improvement: to act as if you denied this, to per- 
petuate any infringement upon the freedom of other 
sects, however vexatious that infringement, and how- 
ever safe its removal, is not to defend an establish- 
ment, but to expose it to unmerited obloquy and re- 
proach. Never think it necessary to be weak and 
childish in the highest concerns of life ; the career of 
the law opens to you many great and glorious oppor- 
tunities of promoting the Gospel of Christ, and of do- 
ing good to your fellow-creatures ; there is no situation 
of that profession in which you can be more great and 
more glorious than when, in the fulness of years, and 
the fulness of honours, you are found defending that 
church which first taught you to distinguish between 
good and evil, and breathed into you the elements of 
religious life ; but when you defend that church, de- 
fend it with enlarged wisdom, and with the spirit of 
magnanimity ; praise its great excellencies ; do not 
perpetuate its little defects ; be its liberal defender, be 
its wise patron, be its real friend. If you can be great 
and bold in human affairs, do not think it necessary 
to be narrow and timid in spiritual concerns ; bind 
yourself up with the real and important interests of 
the church, and hold yourself accountable to God for 



its safety ; but yield up trifles to the altered state of 
the world. Fear no change which lessens the ene« 
mies of that establishment, fear no change which in- 
creases the activity of that establishment, fear no 
change which draws down upon it the more abundant 
prayers and blessings of the human race. 

Justice is found, experimentally, to be most effectu- 
ally promoted by the opposite efforts of practised and 
ingenious men, presenting to the selection of an im- 
partial judge the best arguments for the establishment 
and explanation of truth. It becomes, then, under 
such an arrangement, the decided duty of an advocate 
to use all the arguments in his power to defend the 
cause he has adopted, and to leave the effects of those 
arguments to the judgment of others. However use- 
ful this practice may be for the promotion of public 
justice, it is not without danger to the individual 
whose practice it becomes. It is apt to produce a 
profligate indifference to truth in higher occasions of 
life, where truth cannot, for a moment, be trifled with, 
much less callously trampled ou, much less suddenly 
and totally yielded up to the basest of human motives. 
It is astonishing what unworthy and inadequate no 
tions men are apt to form of the Christian faith. 
Christianity does not insist upon duties to an individu- 
al, and forget the duties which are owing to the great 
mass of individuals, which we call our country ; it 
does not teach you how to benefit your neighbour, and 
leave you to inflict the most serious injuries upon all 
whose interest is bound up with you in the same land : 
I need not say to this congregation that there is a 
wrong and a right in public affairs. I need not prove 
that in any vote, in any line of conduct which affects 
the public interest, every Christian is bound, most so- 
lemnly and most religiously, to follow the dictates ot 
his conscience. Let it be "for, let it be against, let it 
please, let it displease, no matter with whom it sides, 
or what it thwarts, it is a solemn duty, on such occa- 
sions, to act from the pure dictates of conscience, and 
to be as faithful to the interests of the great mass of 
your fellow-creatures, as you would be to the interests 
of any individual of that mass. Why, then, if there 
is any truth in these obsbrvations, can that man be 
pure and innocent before God, can he be quite harm- 
less and respectable before men, who, in mature age. 
at a moment's notice, sacrifices to wealth and power 
all the fixed and firm opinions of his life ; who puts 
his moral principles to sale, and barters his dignity 
and his soul for the baubles of the world? If these 
temptations come across you, then remember the me- 
morable words of the text, ' What shall I do to inherit 
eternal life ?' not this — don't do this ; it is no title to 
eternity to suffer deserved shame among men ; endure 
any thing rather than the loss of character, cling to 
character as your best possession, do not envy men 
who pass you in life, only because they are under less 
moral and religious restraint than yourself. Your ob 
ject is not fame, but honourable fame ; your object is 
not wealth, but wealth worthily obtained ; your ob- 
ject is not power, but power gained fairly and exer- 
cised virtuously. Long-suffering is a great and impor- 
tant lesson in human life ; in no part of human life is 
it more necessary than in your arduous profession. The 
greatest men it has produced have been at some peri- 
od of their professional lives ready to faint at the long 
and apparently fruitless journey ; and if you look at 
those lives, you will find they have been supported by 
a confidence (under God) in the general effects of 
character and industry. They have withstood the al- 
lurements of pleasure, which is the first and most 
common cause of failure ; they have disdained the 
little arts and meannesses which carry base men a 
certain way, and no further ; they have sternly reject- 
ed, also, the sudden means of growing basely rich and 
dishonourably great, with which every man is at one 
time or another sure to be assailed ; and then they 
have broken out into light and glory at the last, ex- 
hibiting to mankind the splendid spectacle of great 
talents long exercised by difficulties, and high princi- 
ples never tainted with guilt. 

After all, remember that your profession is a lotte- 
ry, in which you may lose as well as win ; and you 
must take it as a lottery, in which, after every effort 



THE LAWYER THAT TEMPTED CHRIST. 



of your own, it is impossible to command success ; for 
this you are not accountable, but you are accountable 
lor your purity ; you are accountable for the preserva- 
tion of your character. It is not in every man's pow- 
er to say, I will be a great and successful lawyer, but 
it is in every man's power to say, that he will (with 
God's assistance) be a good Christian, and an honest 
man. Whatever is moral and religious is in your 
own power. If fortune deserts you, do not desert 
yourself; do not undervalue inward consolation ; con- 
nect God with your labour ; remember you are Christ's 
servant ; be seeking always for the inheritance of im- 
mortal life. 

I must urge you by another motive, and bind you by 
another obligation, against the sacrifice of public prin- 
ciple. A proud man, when he has obtained the re- 
ward, and accepted the wages of baseness, enters into 
a severe account with himself, and feels clearly that 
he has suffered degradation ; he may hide it by in- 
creased zeal and violence, or varnish it over by simu- 
lated gaity ; he may silence the world, but he cannot 
silence himself. If this is only a beginning, and you 
mean, henceforward, to trample all principle under 
foot, that is another thing ; but a man of line parts 
and nice feelings is trying a very dangerous experi- 
ment with his happiness, who means to preserve his 
general character, and indulge in one act of baseness. 
Such a man is not made to endure scorn and self-re- 
proach ; it is far from being certain that he will be 
satisfied with that unscriptural bargain in which he has 
gained the honours of the world, and lost the purity of 
uis soul. 

It is impossible in the profession of the law but that 
many opportunities must occur for the exertion of 
charity and benevolence. I do not mean the charity 
of money, but the charity of time, labour, and atten- 
tion ; the protection of those whose resources are fee- 
ble, and the information of those whose knowledge is 
small. In the hands of bad men, the law is some- 
times an artifice to mislead, and sometimes an engine 
to oppress. In your hands it may be, from time to 
time, a buckler to shield, and a sanctuary to save ; you 
may lift up oppressed humility, listen patiently to the 
injuries of the wretched, vindicate their just claims, 
maintain their fair rights, and show, that in the hurry 
of business and the struggles of ambition, you have 
not forgotten the duties of a Christian, and the feel- 
ings of a man. It is in your power, above all other 
Christians, to combine the wisdom of the serpent with 
the innocence of the dove, and to fulfil, with greater 
acuteness and more perfect effect than other men can 
pretend to, the love, the lessons, and the law of 
Christ. 

I should caution the younger part of this profession 
(who are commonly selected for it on account of their 
superior talents,) to cultivate a little more diffidence of 
their own powers, and a little le.ss contempt for re- 
ceived opinions, than is commonly exhibited at the 
beginning of their career ; mistrust of this nature 
teaches moderation in the formation of opinions, and 
prevents the painful necessity of inconsistency and re- 
cantation in future life. It is not possible that the 
ablest young men, at the beginning of their intellectu- 
al existence, can anticipate all those reasons, and dive 
into all those motives, which induce mankind to act 
as they do act, and make the world such as we find it 
to be ; and though there is, doubtless, much to alter, 
and much to improve in human affairs, yet you will 
find mankind not quite so wrong as, in the first ardour 
of youth, you supposed them to be ; and you will find, 
as you advance in life, many new lights to open upon 
you, which nothing but advancing in life could ever 
enable you to observe. I say this, not to check orig- 
inality and vigour of mind, which are the best chat- 
tels and possessions of the world, but to check that 
eagerness which arrives at conclusions without suffi- 
cient premises ; to prevent that violence which is not 
uncommonly atoned for in after-life by the sacrifice of 
ail principle and all opinions ; to lessen that contempt 
which prevents a young man from intproving his own 
understanding, by making a proper and prudent use of 
the understandings of his fellow creatures. 

There is another unchristian fault which must be 



guarded against in the profession of the law, and that 
is, misanthropy, an exaggerated opinion of the faults 
and follies of mankind. It is naturally the worst part 
of mankind who are seen in courts of justice, and with 
whom the professors of the law are most conversant. 
The perpetual recurrence of crime and guilt insensibly 
connects itself with the recollections of the human 
race : mankind are always painted in the attitude of 
suffering and inflicting. It seems as if men were 
bound together by the relations of fraud and crime ; 
but laws are not made for the quiet, the good, and the 
just ; ycu see and know little of them in your profes- 
sion, and. therefore, you forget them ; you see the op- 
pressor, and you let loose your eloquence against him.* 
but you' do not see the man of silent charity, who is 
always seeking out objects of compassion : the faith- 
ful guardian does not come into a court of justice, nor 
the good wife, nor the just servant, nor the dutiful son ; 
you punish the robbers who ill treated the wayfaring 
man, but you know nothing of the good Samaritan who 
bound up his wounds. The lawyer who tempted his 
Master, had heard, perhaps, of the sins of the wo- 
man at the feast, without knowing that she had 
poured her store of precious ointment on the feet of 
Jesus. 

Upon those who are engaged in studying the laws 
of their country, devolve the honourable and Christian 
task of defending the accused ; a sacred duty never to 
be yielded up. never to be influenced by any vehe- 
mence nor intensity of public opinion. In these 
times of profound peace, and unexampled prosperity, 
there is little danger in executing this duty, and little 
temptation to violate it; but human affairs change 
like the clouds of heaven ; another year may find us, 
or may leave us, in all the perils and bitterness of in- 
ternal dissension, and upon one of you may devolve 
the defence of some accused person, the object of 
men's hopes,and fears, the single point on which the 
eyes of a whole people are bent. These are the occa- 
sions which try a man's inward heart, and separate 
the dross of human nature from the gold of human na- 
ture. On these occasions, never mind being mixed up 
for a moment with the criminal and the crime ; fling 
yourself back upon great principles, fling yourself back 
upon God; yield not one atom to violence, suffer not 
the slightest encroachments of injustice, retire not one 
step before the frowns of power, tremble not, for a sin- 
gle instant, at the dread of misrepresentation. The 
great interests of mankind are placed in your hands : 
it is not so much the individual you are defending ; it 
is not so much a matter of consequence whether this or 
that is proved to be a crime, but on such occasions, 
you are often called upon to defend the occupation of 
a defender, to take care that the sacred rights belong- 
ing to that character are not destroyed, that the best 
privilege of your profession, which so much secures 
our regard, and so much redounds to your credit, is 
never soothed by flattery, never corrupted by favour, 
never chilled by fear. You may practise this wicked- 
ness secretly, as you may any other wickedness; 
you may suppress a topic of defence, or soften an at- 
tack upon opponents, or weaken your own argument, 
and sacrifice the man who has put his trust in you, 
rather than provoke the powerful by the triumphant 
establishment of unwelcome innocence ; but if you do 
this, you are a guilty man before God. It is better to 
keep within the pale of honour, it is better to be pure 
in Christ, and to feel that you are pure in Christ ; and 
if the praises of mankind are sweet, if it is ever allow, 
able to a Christian to breathe the incense of popular 
favour, and to say it is grateful and good, it is when 
the honest, temperate, unyielding advocate, who has 
protected innocence from the grasp of power, is fol- 
lowed from the hall of judgment by the prayers and 
blessings of a grateful people. 

These are the Christian excellencies which the 
members of the profession of the law have, above all, 
an opportunity of cultivating ; this is your attribute to 
the happiness of your fe*Uow-creatures, and these your 
preparations for eternal life. Do not lose God in the 
fervour and business of the world ; remember that the 
churches of Christ are more solemn and more sacred 
than your tribunals ; bend not before the judges of the 



296 



WORKS OF THE REV. SIDNEY SMITH. 



king, and forget the Judge of judges ; search not other 
men's hearts without heeding that your own hearts will 
be searched ; be innocent in the midst of subtilty ; do 
not carry the lawful arts of your profession beyond 

Jrour profession ; but when the robe of the advocate is 
aid aside, so live that no man shall dare to suppose 
your opinions venal, or that your talent and energy 
may be bought for a price ; do not heap scorn and 
contempt upon your declining years, by precipitate 
ardour for success in your profession ; but set out with 
a firm determination to be unknown rather than ill- 
known ; and to rise honestly if you rise at all. Let the 
world see that you have risen because the natural probi- 
ty of your heart leads you to truth ; because the preci- 
sion and extent of your legal knowledge enable you to 
find the right way of doing the right thing ; because a 
thorough knowledge of legal art andlegal form is in your 
hands, not an instrument of chicanery, but the plain- 
est, easiest, and shortest way to the end of strife. 
Impress upon yourselves the importance of your pro- 
fession ; consider that some of the greatest and most 
important interests of the world are committed to your 
care ; that you are our protectors against the en- 
croachments of power ; that you are the preservers of 
freedom, the defenders of weakness, the unravellers of 
cunning, the investigators of artifice, the humblers of 
pride, and the scourgers of oppression ; when you are 
silent, the sword leaps from its scabbard, and nations 
are given up to the madness of eternal strife. In all 
the civil difficulties of life, men depend upon your exer- 
cised faculties and your spotless integrity ; and they 
require of you an elevation above all that is mean, and 
a spirit which will never yield when it ought not to 
yield. As long as your profession retains its character 
for learning, the rights of mankind will be well ar- 
ranged ; as long as it retains its character for virtuous 
boldness, those rights will be well defended ; as long as 
it preserves itself pure and uncorruptible on other occa- 
sions not connected with your professions, those talents 
will never be used to the public injury which were 
intended and nurtured for the public good. I hope you 
will weigh these observations, and apply them to the 
business of the ensuing week, and, beyond that, in the 
common occupations of your professions ; always 
bearing in your minds the emphatic words of the text, 
and often in the hurry of your busy, active lives, ho- 
nestly, humbiy, heartily exclaiming to the Son of God, 
' Master, what shall I do to inherit eternal life V 



THE JUDGE THAT SMITES CONTRARY TO THE LAW. 

A SERMON ; 
Preached in the Cathedral -Church of St. Peter, York, 
before the Hon. Sir John Bayley, Knt., and the Hon. 
Sir George Sowley Holroyd, Knt., Justices of the Court 
of King's Bench ; March 28, ] 824. 

Acts xxiiii 3. 

* SITTEST THOU HERE TO JUDGE ME AFTER THE LAW, AND 
COMMANDEST THOU ME TO BE SMITTEN, CONTRARY TO 
THE LAW?' 

With these bold words St. Paul repressed the unjust 
violence of that ruler who would have silenced his 
arguments, and extinguished his zeal for the Christian 
faith. Knowing well the misfortunes which awaited 
him, prepared for deep and various calamity, not iguo- 
norant of the violence of the Jewish multitude, not 
unused to suffer, not unwilling to die, he had not pre- 
pared himself for the monstrous spectacle of perverted 
justice ; but loosing that spirit to whose fire and firm- 
ness we owe the very existence of the Christian faith, 
he burst into that bold rebuke which brought back the 
extravagance of power under the control of law, and 
branded it with the feelings of shame : ' Sittest thou 
here to judge me after the law, and commandest thou 
me to be smitten, contrary to the law V 
, I would observe that, in the Gospels, and the various 
parts of the New Testament, the words of our Saviour 
and of St. Paul, when they contain any opinion, are 
always to be looked upon as lessons of wisdom to us, 
however incidentally they may have been delivered, 



and however shortly they may have been expressed. 
As their words were to be recorded by inspired wri- 
ters, and to go down to future ages, nothing can have 
been said without reflection and design. Nothing is 
to be lost, everything is to be studied : a great moral 
lesson is often conveyed in a few words. Read slow 
ly, think deeply, let every word enter into your soul, 
for it was intended for your soul. 

I take these words of St. Paul as a condemnation of 
that man who smites contrary to the law ; as a praise 
of that man who judges accdrding to the law ; as a 
religious theme upon the importance of human justice 
to the happiness of mankind ; and, if it be that theme, 
it is appropriate to this place, and to the solemn pub- 
lic duties of the past and the ensuing week, over which 
some here present will preside, at which many here 
present will assist, and which almost all here present 
will witness. 

I will discuss, then, the importance of judging, ac- 
cording to the law, or, in other words, of the due admi- 
nistration of justice upon ihe character and happiness 
of nations. .And in so doing, I will begin with stating 
a few of those circumstances which may mislead even 
good and conscientious men, and subject them to the 
unchristian sin of smiting contrary to the law. I will 
state how that justice is purified and perfected by 
which the happiness and character of nations are 
affected to a good purpose. 

I do this with less fear of being misunderstood, 
because. 1 am speaking before two great magistrates, 
who have lived much among us ; and whom — because 
they have lived much among us — we have all learned 
to respect and regard, and to whom no man fears to 
consider himself as accountable, because all men see 
that they, in the administration of their high office, 
consider themselves as deeply and daily accountable 
to God. 

And let no man say, { Why teach such things ? do 
you think the}'' must not have occurred to those to 
whom they are a concern V I answer to this, that no 
man preaches novelties and discoveries; the object of 
preaching is, constantly to remind mankind of what 
mankind are constantly forgetting; not to supply the 
defects of human intelligence, but to fortify the fee- 
bleness of human resolutions, — to recall mankind from 
the bypaths where they turn, into that broad path of 
salvation which all know, but few tread. These plain 
lessons the humblest ministers of the Gospel may 
teach, if they are honest, and the most powerful 
Christians will ponder, if they are wise. No man, 
whether he bear the sword of the law, or whether he 
bear that sceptre which the sword of the law cannot 
reach, can answer for his own heart to-morrow, and 
can say to the teacher, — <■ Thou wamest me, thou 
teachest me, in vain.' 

A Christian judge, in a free land, should, with the 
most scrupulous exactness, guard himself from the in- 
fluence of those party feelings, upon which, perhaps 
the preservation of political liberty depends, but by 
which the better reason of individuals is often blinded 
and the tranquillity of the public disturbed. I am not 
talking of the ostentatious display of such feelings; I 
am hardly talking of any gratification of which the 
individual himself is conscious, but I am raising up a 
wise and useful jealous3 r of the. encroachment of those 
feelings, which, when they do encroach, lessen the 
value of the most valuable, and lower the importance 
of the most important men in the country. I admit it 
to be extremely difficult to live amidst the agitations, 
contests and discussions of a free people, and to re- 
main in that state of cool, passionless Christian can. 
dour which society expect from their great magis- 
trates ; but it is the pledge that magistrate has given, 
it is the life he has taken up, it is Ihe class of quali- 
ties which has promised us, and for which he has ren- 
dered himself responsible ; it is the same fault in him 
which want of courage would be in some men, and 
want of moral regularity in others. It runs coulter 
to those very purposes, and sins against those utilities 
for which the very office was created; without these 
qualities, he who ought to be cool, is heated ; he who 
ought to be neutral, is partial ; the ermine of justice 
is spotted ; the balance of -"justice is unpoised ; the 



THE JUDGE THAT SMITES CONTRARY TO THE LAW. 



297 



fillet of justice is torn off; and he who sits to judge 
after the law, smites contrary to the law. 

And if the preservation of calmness amidst the 
strong feelings by which a judge is surrounded be 
difficult, is it not also honourable ? and would it be 
honourable if it were not difficult ? Why do men quit 
their homes, and give up their common occupations, 
and repair to the tribunal of justice ? Why this bus- 
tie of business, why this decoration and display, and 
why are all eager to pay our homage to the dispensers 
of justice? Because we all feel that there must be, 
somewhere or other, a check to human passions ; be- 
cause we all know the immense value and importance 
of men in whose placid equity and mediating wisdom, 
we can trust in the worst of times ; because we cannot 
cherish too strongly and express too plainly that reve- 
rence we feel for men who can rise up in the ship of 
"the state, and rebuke the storms of the mind, and bid 
its angry passions be still. 

A Christian judge in a free land, should not only 
keep his mind clear from the violence of party feel- 
ings, but he should be very careful to preserve his in- 
dependence, by seeking no promotion, and asking no 
favours from those who govern ; or at least, to be 
(which is an experiment not without danger to his 
salvation) so thoroughly confident of his motives and 
his conduct, that he is certain the hope of favour to 
come, or gratitude for favour past, will never cause 
him to swerve from the strict line of duty. It is ofteu 
the lot of a judge to be placed, not only between the 
accuser and the accused, not only between the com- 
plainant and him against whom it is complained, but 
between the governors and the governed, between the 
people and those whose lawful commands the people 
are bound to obey. In these sort of contests it un- 
fortunately happens that the rulers are sometimes as 
angry as the ruled ; the whole eyes of a nation are 
fixed upon one man, and upon his character and con- 
duct the stability and happiness of the times seem to 
depend. The best and firmest magistrates cannot 
tell how they may act under such circumstances, but 
every man may prepare himself for acting well under 
such circumstances, by cherishing that quiet feeling 
of independence which removes one temptation to act 
ill Every man may avoid putting himself in a situa- 
tion where his hopes of advantage are on one side, 
and his sense of duty on the other ; such a temptation 
may be withstood, but it is better it should not be en- 
countered. Far better that feeling which says, ' I 
have vowed a vow before God ; I have put on the robe 
of justice ; farewell, avarice, farewell ambition ; pass 
me who will, slight me who will, I live henceforward 
only for the great duties of life ; my business is on 
earth, my hope and my reward are in God.' 

He who takes the office of a judge, as it now exists 
in this country, takes in his hands a splendid gem, 
good and glorious, perfect and pure. Shall he give it 
up mutilated, shall he mar it, shall he darken it, shall 
it emit no light, shall it be valued at no price, shall it 
excite no wonder ? Shall he find it a diamond, shall 
he leave it a stone ? What shall we say to the man 
who would wilfully destroy with fire the magnificent 
temple of God, in which I am now pleaching ? Far 
worse is he who ruins the moral edifices of the world, 
which time and toil, and many prayers to God, and 
many sufferings of men, have reared ; who puts out 
the light of the times in which he lives, and leaves us 
to wander amid the darkness of corruption and the 
desolation of sin. There may be, there probably is, 
in this church, some young man who may hereafter 
fill the office of an English judge, when the greater 
part of those who hear me are dead, and mingled with 
the dust of the grave. Let him remember my words, 
and let them form and fashion his spirit ; he cannot 
tell in what dangerous and awful times he may be 
placed ; but as a mariner looks to his compass in the 
calm, and looks to his compass in the storm, and 
never keeps his eyes off his compass, so, in every 
vicissitude of a judicial fife, deciding for the people, 
deciding against the people, protecting the just rights 
of kings, or restraining their unlawful ambition, let 
him ever cling to that pure, exalted and Christian in- 
dependence which towers over the little motives of 



life ; which no hope of favour can influence, wiiich no 
effort of power can control. 

A Christian judge in a free country should respect, 
on every occasion, those popular institutions of justice 
which were intended for his control, and for our 
security ; to see humble men collected, accidentally 
from the neighbourhood, treated with tenderness and 
courtesy by supreme magistrates of deep learning and 
practised understanding, from whose views they are, 
perhaps, at that moment differing, and whose direc- 
tions they do not choose to follow; to see at such 
limes every disposition to warmth restrained, and 
every tendency to contemptuous feeling kept back ; to 
witness the submission of the great and wise, not when 
it is extorted by necessity, but when it is practised 
with willingness and grace, is a spectacle which is 
very grateful to Englishmen, which no other country 
sees, which, above all things, shows that a judge has 
a pure, gentle, and Christian heart, and that he never 
wishes to smite contrary to the law. 

May I add the great importance in a judge of cour- 
tesy to all men, and that he should, on all occasions, 
abstain from unnecessary bitterness and asperity of 
speech. A judge always speaks with impunity, and 
always speaks with effect. His words should be 
weighed, because they entail no .evil upon himself, 
and much evil upon others. The language of passion, 
the language of sarcasm, the language of satire, is 
not, on such occasions, Christian language ; it is not 
the language of a judge. There is a propriety of re- 
buke and condemnation, the justice of which is felt 
even by him who suffers under it ; but when magis- 
trates," under the mask of law, aim at the offender 
more than the offence, and are more studious of inflict- 
ing pain than repressing error or crime, the office 
suffers as much as the judge ; the respect of justice is 
lessened ; and the school of pure reason becomes the 
hated theatre of mischievous passion. 

A Christian judge who means to be just, must not 
fear to smite according to the law ; he must remember 
that he beareth not the sword in vain. Under his pro- 
tection we live, under his protection we acquire, under 
his protection we enjoy. Without him, no man would 
defend his character, no man would preserve his sub- 
stance ; proper pride, just gains, valuable exertions, 
all depend upon his firm wisdom. If he shrink from 
the severe duties of his office, he saps the foundation 
of social life, betrays the highest interests of the 
world, and sits not to judge according to the law. 

The topics of mercy are the smallness of the offence 
— the infrequency of the offence. The temptations to 
the culprit, the moral weakness of the culprit, the 
severity of the law, the error of the law, the different 
state of society, the altered state of feeling, and, 
above all, the distressing doubt whether a human 
being in the lowest abyss of poverty and ignorance, 
has not done injustice to himself, and is not perishing 
away from the want of knowledge, the want of for- 
tune, and the want of friends. All magistrates feel 
these things in the early exercise of their judicial 
power, but the Christian judge always feels them, is 
always tender when he is going to shed humau blood ; 
retires from the business of men, communes with his 
own heart, ponders on the work of death, and prays 
to that Saviour who redeemed him, that he may not 
shed the blood of man in vain. 

These, then, are those faults ivhich expose a man to 
the danger of smiting contrary to the law ; a judge 
must be clear from the spirit of party, independent of 
all favour, well inclined to the popular institutions of 
his country; firm in applying the rule, merciful in 
making the exception ; patient, guarded in his speech, 
gentle and courteous to all. Add his learning, his 
labour, his experience, his probity, his practised and 
acute faculties, and this ma-i is the light of the world, 
who adorns human fife, and gives security to that life 
which he adorns. 

Now see the coriequence of that state of justice 
which this charo-" .er implies, and the explanation of 
all that deserve a honour we confer on the preservation 
of such a character, and all the wise jealousy we fee* 
at the sli^ntest injury or deterioration it may expe* 
rience. 



298 



WORKS OF THE LEV. SIDNEY SMITH. 



The most obvious and important use of this perfect 
justice is, that it makes nations safe : under common 
circumstances, the institutions of justice seem to have 
little or no bearing upon the safety and security of a 
country, but in periods of real danger, when a nation, 
surrounded by foreign enemies, contends not for the 
boundaries of empire, but for the very being and ex- 
istence of empire, then it is that the advantages of 
just institutions are discovered. Every man feels that 
he has a country, that he has something worth preserv- 
ing, and worth contending for. Instances are remem- 
bered where the weak prevailed over the strong ; one 
man recalls to mind when a just and upright judge 
protected him from unlawful violence, gave him back 
his vineyard, rebuked his oppressor, restored him to 
his rights, published, condemned, and rectified the 
wrong. This is what is called country. Equal rights 
to unequal possessions, equal justice to the rich and 
poor ; this is what men come out to fight for, and to 
defend. Such a country has iya legal injuries to re- 
member, no legal murders to revenge, no legal robbery 
*to redress ; it is strong in its justice ; it is then that 
the use and object of all this assemblage of gentlemen 
and arrangement of juries, and the deserved veneration 
in which we hold the character of English judges, are 
understood in all their bearings, and in their fullest ef- 
fects : men die for such things — they cannot be sub- 
dued by foreign force where such just practices prevail. 
The sword of ambition is shivered to pieces against 
such a bulwark. Nations fall where judges are unjust, 
because there is nothing which the multitude think 
worth defending ; but nations do not fall which are 
treated as we are treated, but they rise as we have ri- 
sen, and they shine as we have shone, and die as we 
have died, too much used to justice, and too much used 
to freedom, to care for that life which is not just and 
free. I call you all to witness if there is any exagge- 
rated picture in this; the sword is just sheathed,~the 
flag is just furled, the last sound of the trumpet has 
just died away. You all remember what a spectacle 
this country exhibited : one heart, one voice — one wea- 
pon, one purpose. And why ? Because this country 
is a country of the law ; because the judge is a judge 
for the peasant as well as for the palace ; because eve- 
ry man's happiness is guarded by fixed rules from tyr- 
anny and caprice. This town, this week, the business 
of the few next days, would explain to any enlightened 
European why other nations did, fall in the storms of 
the world, and why we did not fall. The Christian 
patience you may witness, the impartiality of the 
judgment-seat, the disrespect of persons, the disregard 
of consequences. These attributes of justice do not 
end with arranging your conflicting rights, and mine ; 
they give strength to the English name ; they turn the 
animal courage of this people into moral and religious 
courage, and present to the lowest of mankind plain 
reasons and strong motives why they should resist ag- 
gression from without, and bend themselves a living 
rampart round the land of their birth. 

There is another reason why every wise man is so 
scrupulously jealous of the charactor of English just- 
ice. It puts an end to civil dissension. What other 
countries obtain by bloody wars, is here obtained by 
the decisions of our own tribunals ; unchristian pas- 
sions are laid to rest by these tribunals ; brothers are 
brothers again ; the Gospel resumes its empire, and 
because all confide in the presiding magistrate, and 
because a few plain men are allowed to decide upon 
their own conscientious impression of facts, civil dis- 
cord, years of convulsion, endless crimes are spared; 
the storm is laid, and those who came in clamouring 
for revenge, go back together in peace from the hall 
of judgment to the loom and the plough, to the senate 
and the church. 

The whole tone and tenour of public morals are af- 
fected by the state of supreme justice ; it extinguishes 
revenge, it communicates a spirit of purity and up- 
rightness to inferior magistrates ; it makes the great 
good, by taking away impunity ; l banishes fraud, ob- 
liquity, and solicitation, and teaches men that the law 
is their right. Truth is its handmaid, freedom its child, 
peace is its companion ; safety walks in its steps, vic- 
tory follows in its train : it is the highest emacation of 



the Gospel ; it is the greatest attribute of God ; it is 
that centre round which human motives and passions 
turn : and justice sitting on high, sees genius and pow- 
er, and wealth and birth, revolving round her throne ; 
and teaches their paths, and marks out their orbits, 
and warns all with a loud voice, and rules with a 
strong arm, and carries order and discipline into a 
world, which, but for her, would only be a wild waste 
of passions. Look what we are, and what just laws 
have done for us : — a land of piety and charity ; — a 
land of churches, hospitals, and altars ; — a nation of 
good Samaritans ; a people of universal compassion. 
All lands, ail seas, have heard we are brave. We have 
just sheathed that sword which defended the world ; 
we have just laid down that buckler which covered the 
nations of the earth. God blesses the soil with fertili- 
ty; English looms labour for every climate. All the 
waters of the globe are covered with English ships . 
We are softened by fine arts, civilized by humane lit- 
erature, instructed by deep science ; and every people, 
as they break their feudal chains, look to the founders 
and fathers of freedom for examples which may ani- 
mate, and rules which may guide. If ever a nation 
was happy — if ever a nation was visibly blessed by 
God — if ever a nation was honoured abroad, and left at 
home under a governmenment (which we can now 
conscientiously call a liberal government) to the full 
career of talent, industry, and vigour, we are at this 
moment that people — and this is our happy lot. — First, 
the Gospel has done it, and then justice has done it ; 
and he who thinks it his duty to labour that this hap- 
py condition of existence may remain, must guard the 
piety of these times, and he must watch over the spi- 
rit of justice which exists in these times. First, he 
must take care that the altars of God are not polluted, 
that the Christian faith is retained in purit) r and in 
perfection ; and then turning to human affairs, let him 
strive for spotless, incorruptible justice ; praising, 
honouring, and loving the just judge, and abhorring, as 
the worst enemy of mankind, him who is placed there 
to l judge after the law, and who smites contrary to 
the law.' 



A LETTER TO THE ELECTORS UPON THE 
CATHOLIC QUESTION. 

Why is not a Catholic to be believed on his oath ? 

What says the law cf the land to this extravagant 
piece of injustice? It is no challenge against a jury- 
man to say he is a Catholic ; he sits in judgment upon 
your life and your property. Did any man ever bear it 
said that such or such a person was put to death, or 
that be lost his property, because a Catholic was 
among the jurymen ? Is the question ever put ? Does 
it ever enter into th^ mind of the attorney or the coun- 
sellor to inquire into the faith of the jury ? If a man 
sell a horse, or a house, or a field, does he ask if the 
purchaser is a Catholic ? Appeal to your own experi- 
ence, and try by that fairest of all tests the justice of 
this enormous charge. 

We are in treaty with many of the powers of Europe , 
because we believe in the good faith of Catholics. Two 
thirds of Europe are, in fact, Catholics ; are they all 
perjured? For the first fourteen centuries all the 
Christian world were Catholic ; did they live in a con- 
stant state of perjury? I am sure these objections 
against the Catholics are often made by very serious 
and honest men, but I much doubt if Voltaire has ad- 
vanced any thing against the Christian religion so hor- 
rible, as to say that two-thirds of those who profess it 
are unfit for all the purposes of civil life ; for who is 
fit to five in society who does not respect oaths ? But 
if this imputation be true, what folly to agitate such 
questions as the civil emancipation of Catholics. If 
they are always ready to support falsehood by an ap. 
peal to God, why are they suffered to breathe the air 
of England, or drink the waters of England? Why 
are they not driven into the howling wilderness ? But 
now they possess, and bequeath, and witness, and de- 
cide civil rights ; and save life as physicians, and de- 
fend property as lawyers, and judge property as jury- 






CATHOLIC QUESTION. 



299 



men ; and you pass laws, enabling them to command 
all your fleets and armies,* and then you turn round 
upon the very man you have made the master of the 
European seas, and the arbiter of nations, and tell him 
he is not to be believed on his oath. 

I have lived a little in the world, but I never hap- 
pened to hear a single Catholic even suspected of get- 
ting into' office by violating his oath ; the oath which 
they are accused of violating is an insuperable barrier 
to them all. Is there a more disgraceful spectacle in 
the world than that of the Duke of Norfolk hovering 
round the House of Lords in the execution of his office, 
which he cannot enter as a peer of the realm ? dis- 
graceful to the bigotry and injustice of his country, to 
his own sense of duty honourable in the extreme ; he 
is the leader of a band of ancient and high-principled 
gentlemen, Avho submit patiently to obscurity and pri- 
vation, rather than do violence to their conscience. — 
In all the fury of party, I never heard the name of a 
single Catholic mentioned, who was suspected of hav- 
ing gained, or aimed at, any political advantage, by 
violating his oath. I have never heard so bitter a 
slander supported by the slightest proof. Every man 
in the circle of his acquaintance has met with Catho- 
lics, and lived with them probably as companions. If 
this immoral lubricity were their characteristic, it 
would surely be perceived in common life. Every 
man's experience would corroborate the imputation ; 
but I can honestly say that some of the best and most 
excellent men I have ever met with have been Catho- 
lics ; perfectly alive to the evil, and inconvenience of 
their situation, but thinking themselves bound by the 
law of God and the law of honour, not to avoid perse- 
cution by falsehood and apostasy. But why (as has 
been asked ten thousand times before) do you lay such 
a stress upou these oaths of exclusion, if the Catho- 
lics do not respect oaths ? You compel me, a Catho- 
lic, to make a declaration against transubstantiation, 
lor what purpose but to keep me out of Parliament ? 
Why. then, I respect oaths and declarations, or else I 
should perjure myself, and get into Parliament ; and 
if I do not respect oaths, of what use is it to enact 
them to keep me out? A farmer has some sheep, 
which he chooses to keep from a certain field, and to 
effect this object, he builds a wall: there are two ob- 
jections to his proceeding ; the first is, that it is for the 
good of the farm that the sheep should come into the 
field ; and so the wall is not only useless, but perni- 
cious. The second is, that he himself thoroughly be- 
lives at the time of building the wall, that all the 
sheep are in the constant habit of leaping over such 
walls. His first intention with respect to the sheep is 
absurd, his means more absurd, and his error is perlect 
in all its parts. He tries to do that which, if he suc- 
ceeds will be very foolish, and tries to do it by means 
which he himself, at the time of using them, admits 
to be inadequate to the purpose ; but I hope this ob- 
jection to the oaths of Catholics is* disappearing ; I be- 
lieve neither Lord Liverpool nor Mr. Peel, (a very 
candid and honourable man), nor the archbishops 
(who are both gentlemen), nor Lord Eldon, nor Lord 
Stowell (whose Protestanisrn nobody calls in ques- 
tion) , would make such a charge. It is confined to 
provincial violence, and to the politicians of the second 
table. I remember hearing the Catholics from the 
hustings of an election accused of disregarding oaths, 
and within an hour from that time, I saw five Catho- 
lic voters rejected, because they would not take the 
oath of supremacy ; and these were not men of rank 
who tendered themselves, but ordinary tradesmen. — 
The accusation was received with loud huzzas ; the 
poor Catholics retired unobserved and in silence. No 
one praised the conscientious feelings of the constitu- 
ents ; no one rebuked the calumny of the candidate. 
This is precisely the way in which the Catholics are 
treated ; the very same man who encourages among 
his partisans the doctrine that Catholics are not to be 
believed upon their oaths, directs his agents upon the 
hustings, to be very watchful that all Catholics should 
oe prevented from voting, by tendering to them the 



oath of supremacy, which he is certain not one of 
them will take. If this is not calumny and injus- 
tice, I know not what human conduct can deserve the 
name. 

If you believe the oath of a Catholic, see what he 
will swear, and what he will not swear ; read the oaths 
he already takes, and say whether, in common can- 
dour or in common sense, you can require more secu- 
rity than he offers you. Before the year 1793, the 
Catholic was subject to many more vexatious laws 
than he now is ; in that year an act passed in his fa- 
vour, but before the Catholic could exempt himself 
from his ancient pains and penalties, it was necessary 
to take an oath. This oath was, I believe, drawn up 
by Dr. Duigenan, the bitter and implacable enemy of 
the sect ; and it is so important an oath, so little known 
and read in England, that I cannot, in spite of my 
wish to be brief, abstain from quoting it. I deny your 
right to call no Popery, till you are master of its con- 
tents. 

i I do swear, that I do abjure, condemn, and de- 
test, as unchristian and impious, the principle, that 
it is lawful to murder, destroy, or any ways injure, 
any person whatsoever, for or under the pretext of 
being a heretic ; and I do declare solemnly, before 
God, that I believe no act, in itself unjust, immmoral, 
or wicked, can ever be justified or excused by or un- 
der presence or colour, that it was done either for the 
good of the church, or in obedience to any ecclesias- 
tical power whatsoever. I also declare that it is not 
an article of the Catholic faith, neither am I hereby 
required to believe or profess, that the pope is infalli- 
ble ; or that I am bound to obey any order, in its own 
nature immoral, though the pope, or any ecclesiasti- 
cal power, should issue or direct such order ; but, on 
the contrary, I hold that it would be sinful in me to pay 
any respect or obedience thereto. I further declare, 
that I do not believe that any sin whatsoever commit- 
ted by me, can be forgiven at the mere will of any pope 
or any priest, or of any persons whatsoever; but that 
sincere sorrow for past sins, a firm and sincere reso- 
lution to avoid future guilt, and to atone to God, are 
previous and indispensable requisites to establish a 
well-founded expectation of forgiveness ; and that any 
person who receives absolution, without these previ- 
ous requisites, so far from obtaining thereby any re- 
mission of his sins, incurs the additional guilt of vio- 
lating a sacrament; and I do swear, that I will 
defend, to the utmost of m)' power, the settlement and 
arrangement of property in this country, as establish- 
ed by the laws now in being. — I do hereby disclaim, 
disavow, and solemnly abjure any intention to subvert 
the present church establishment, for the purpose of 
substituting a Catholic establishment in its stead ; and 
I do solemnly swear, that I will not exercise any 
privilege to which I am or may become entitled, to 
disturb and weaken the Protestant religion, and Pro- 
testant government in this kingdom. So help me 
God.' 

This oath is taken by every Catholic in Ireland, and 
a similar oath, allowing for the difference of circum- 
stances of the two countries, is taken in England. 

It appears from the evidence taken before the two 
houses, and lately printed, that if Catholic emancipa- 
tion were carried, there would be little or no difficulty 
in obtaining from the pope an agreement, that the 
nomination of the Irish Catholic bishops should be 
made at home constitutionally by the Catholics, as it 
is now in fact,* and in practice, and that the Irish 
prelates would go a great way, in arranging a system 
of general education, if the spirit of proselytism, 
which now renders such a union impossible, were laid 
aside. This great measure carried, the Irish Catho- 
lics would give up all their endowments abroad, if 
they receive for them an equivalent at home ; for now 
Irish priests are fast resorting to the continent for 
education, allured by the endowments which the 
French government are cunningly restoring and aug- 



* There is no law to prevent a Catholic from having the 
command of a British fleet or a British army. 



* The Catholic bishops since the death of the pretender 
are recommended either by the chapters or the parochial 
clergy, to the pope ; and there is no instance of his devia- 
ting from their choice. 



300 



WORKS OF THE REV. SIDNEY SMITH. 



meriting. The intercourse with the see of Rome 
might and Would, after Catholic emancipation, be so 
managed, that it should be open, upon grave occa- 
sions, or, if thought proper, on every occasion, to the 
inspection of commissioners. There is no security 
compatible with the safety of their faith, which the 
Catholics are not willing to give. But what is Catho- 
lic emancipation as far as England is concerned? not 
an equal right to office with the member of the Church 
of England, but a participation in the same pains and 
penalties as those, to which the Protestant dissenier 
is subjected by the corporation and test acts. If the 
utility of these last mentioned laws is to be measured 
by the horror and perturbatiion their repeal would ex- 
cite, they are laws of the utmost importance to the 
defence of the English Church : but if it be of impor- 
tance to the church that pains and penalties should be 
thus kept suspended over men's heads, then these 
bills are an effectual security against Catholics as well 
as Protestants ; and the manacles so much confided 
in, are not taken off, but loosened, and the prayer of a 
Catholic is this : — ' I cannot now become an alder- 
man without perjury. 1 pray of you to improve my 
condition so far, that if I become an alderman I may 
be only exposed to a penalty of 500Z.' There are two 
common errors upon the subject of Catholic emancipa- 
tion; the one, that the emancipated Catholic is to be 
put on a better footing than the Protestant dissenter, 
whereas he will be put precisely on the same footing; 
the other, that he is to be admitted to civil offices, 
without any guard, exception, or reserve ; whereas, in 
the various bills which have been from time to time 
brought forward, the legal wit of man has been ex- 
hausted to provide against every surmise, suspicion, 
and whisper of the most remote danger to the Protes- 
tant church. 

The Catholic question is not an English question, 
but an Irish one ; or rather, it is no otherwise an En- 
glish question than as it is an Irish one. As for the 
handful of Catholics that are in England, no one, I 
presume, can be so extravagant as to contend, if they 
were the only Catholics we had to do with, that it 
would be of the slightest possible consequence to what 
offices of the state they were admitted. It would be 
quite as necessary to exclude the Sandemanians, who 
are sixteen in number, or to make a test act against 
the followers of Joanna Southcote, who amount to one 
hundred and twenty persons. A little chalk on the 
wall and a profound ignorance of the subject, soon raise 
a cry of no Popery ; but I question if the danger of 
admitting five popish peers and two commoners to the 
benefits of the constitution could raise a mob in any 
market town in England. Whatever good may accrue 
to England from the emancipation, or evil may befall 
this country for withholding emancipation, will reach 
us only through the medium of Ireland. 

I beg to remind you, that in talking of the Catholic 
religion, you must talk of the Catholic religion as it is 
carried on in Ireland ; you have nothing to do with 
Spain, or France, or Italy : the religion you are to 
examine is the Irish Catholic religion. You are not 
to consider what it was. but what it is ; not what indi- 
viduals profess, but what is generally practised. I 
constantly see, in advertisements from county meet- 
ings, all these species of monstrous injustice played 
off' against the Catholics. The Inquisition exists in 
Spain and Portugal, therefore I confound prace, and 
vote against the Catholics of Ireland, where it never 
did exist, nor was purposed to be instituted.* There 
have been many cruel persecutions of Protestants by 
Catholic governments ; and therefore I will confound 
time and place, and vote against the Irish, who live 
centuries after these persecutions, and in a totally dif- 
ferent country. Doctor this, or Doctor that, of the 
Catholic Church, has written a very violent and absurd 
pamphlet ; therefore I will confound persons, and vote 
against the whole Irish Catholic church, which has 
neither sanctioned nor expressed any such opinions. 

* While Mary was burning Protestants in England not 
a single Protestant was executed in Ireland ; and yet the 
terrors of that reign are, at this moment, one of the most 
operative causes of the exclusion of Irish Catholics. 



I will continue the incapacities of the men of this age, 
because some men, in distant ages, deserved ill of 
other men in distant ages. They shall expiate the 
crimes committed, before they were born, in a land 
they never saw, by individuals they never heard of. 
I will charge them with every act of folly which they 
have never sanctioned and cannot control. I Aviil 
sacrifice space, time, and identity, to my zeal for the 
Protestant Church. Now, in the midst of all this vio- 
lence, consider, for a moment, how you are imposed 
upon by words, and what a serious violation of the 
rights of your fellow-creatures you are committing. 
Mr. Murphy lives in Limerick, and Mr. Murphy and 
his son are subjected to a thousand inconveniences and 
disadvantages because they are Catholics. Murphy 
is a wealthy, honourable, and excellent man ; he ought 
to be in the corporation ; he cannot get in because he is 
a Catholic. His son ought to be king's counsel for his 
talents, and his standing at the bar; he is prevented 
from reaching this dignity because he is a Catholic. 
Why, what reasons do you hear lor all this ? Because 
Queen Mary, three hundred years before the natal day 
of Mr. Murphy, murdered Protestants in Smithfieid"; 
because Louis XIV. dragooned his Protestant sub- 
jects, when the predecessor of Murphy's predecessor 
was not in being ; because men are confined in prison 
at Madrid, twelve degrees more south than Murphy 
has ever been in his life ; all ages, all climates, are 
ransacked to perpetuate the slavery of Murphy, the 
ill-fated victim of political anachronisms. 

Suppose a barrister, in defending a prisoner, were 
to say to the judge, ' My Lord, I humbly submit to 
your lordship that the indictment against the prisoner 
cannot stand good in law ; and as the safety of a fel- 
low-creature is concerned, I request your lordship's 
patient attention to my objections. In the first place, 
the indictment does not pretend that the prisoner at 
the bar is not himself guilty of the offence, but that 
some persons of the same religious sect as himself are 
so ; in whose crime he cannot (I submit), by any pos- 
sibility, be implicated, as these criminal persons lived 
three hundred years before the prisoner was born. In 
the next place, my lord, the venue of several crimes 
imputed to the prisoner is laid in countries to which 
the jurisdiction of this country does not extend ; in 
France, Spain, and Italy, where also the prisoner has 
never been; and as to the argument used by my 
learned brother, that it is only want of power and not 
want of will, and that the prisoner would commit the 
crime if he could • I humbly submit that the custom 
of England has been to wait for the overt act before 
pain and penalty are inflicted, and that your lordship 
would pass a most doleful assize, if punishment de- 
pended upon evil volition; if men were subjected to 
legal incapacities from the mere suspicion that they 
would do harm if they could; and if it were admitted 
to be ^sufficient proof of this suspicion, that men of 
this faith in distant ages, different countries, and 
under different circumstances, had planned evil, and 
when occasion offered, done it.' 

When are mercy and justice, in fact, ever to return 
upon the earth, if the sins of the elders are to be for 
ever visited on these who are not even their children ? 
Should the first act of liberated Greece be to recom- 
mence the Trojan war? Are the French never to for- 
get the Sicilian vespers ; or the Americans the long 
war waged against their liberties? Is any rule wise, 
which may set the Irish to recollect what they have 
suffered ? 

The real danger is this — that you have four Irish ( 
Catholics for one Irish Protestant. That is the mat- 
ter of fact, which none of us can help. Is it better po- 
licy to make friends, rather than enemies, of this im 
mense population? I allow there is danger to the 
Protestant Church, but much more danger, I am sure 
there is, in resisting, than admitting the claims of the 
Catholics. If I might indulge in visions of glory, and 
imagine myself an Irish dean or bishop, with an im- 
mense ecclesiastical income ; if the justice or injustice 
of the case were entirely indifferent to me, and my 
only object were to live at ease in my possessions, 
there is no measure for which I should be so anxious as 
that of Catholic emancipation. The Catholics are now 



CATHOLIC QUESTION. 



301 



extremely angry and discontented at being shut out 
from so many offices and honours ; the incapacities to 
which they are subjected thwart them in all their pur- 
suits ; they feel they are a degraded caste. The Pro- 
testant feels he is a privileged caste, and not only the 
Protestant gentleman feels this, but every Protestant 
servant feels it, and takes care that his Catholic fel- 
low-servant shall perceive it. The difference' between 
the two religions is an eternal source of enmity, ill- 
will, and hatred, and the Catholic remains in a state 
of permanent disaffection to the government under 
which he lives. I repeat that if I were a member of 
the Irish church, I should be afraid of this position of 
affairs. I should fear it in peace, on account of riot 
and insurrection, and in war, on account of rebellion. 
I should think that my greatest security consisted in 
removing all just cause of complaint from the Catholic 
society, in endearing them to the English constitution, 
by making them feel, as soon as possible, that they 
shared in its blessings. I should really think my 
tithes and my glebe, upon such a plan, worth twenty 
years' purchase more than under the present system. 
Suppose the Catholic layman were to think it an evil, 
that his own church should be less splendidly endow- 
ed than that of the Protestant Church, whose popula- 
tion is so inferior ; yet if he were free himself, and had 
nothing to complain of, he would not rush into rebel- 
lion and insurrection, merely to augment the income 
of his priest. At present you bind the laity and cler- 
gy in one common feeling of injustice ; each feels for 
himself, and talks of the injuries of the other. The 
obvious consequence of Catholic emancipation would 
be to separate their interests. But another important 
consequence of Catholic emancipation would be to im- 
prove the condition of the clergy. Their chapels 
would be put in order, their incomes increased, and 
we should soon hear nothing more of the Catholic 
Church. If this measure were carried in March, I be- 
lieve by the January following, the whole question 
would be as completely forgotten as the sweating 
sickness, and that nine Doctor Doyles, at the rate of 
thirty years to a Doyle, would pats away one after 
the other, before any human being heard another syl- 
lable on the subject. All men gradually yield to the 
^omforts of a good income. Give the Irish archbishop 
'_ £1200 per annum; the bishop £800, the priest £200, 
the coadjutor £100, per annum, and the cathedral of 
Dublin is almost as safe as the cathedral of York.* 
This is the real secret of putting an end to the Catho- 
lic question ; there is no other ; but, remember, I am 
speaking of provision for the Catholic clergy after 
emancipation, not before. There is not an Irish cler- 
gyman of the Church of Rome who would touch one 
penny of the public money before the laity were re- 
stored to civil rights, — and why not pay the Catholic 
clergy as well as the Presbyterian clergy? Ever 
since the year 1803, the Presbyterian clergy in the 
North of Ireland have been paid by the government, 
and the grant is annually brought forward in Parlia- 
ment ; and not only are the Presbyterians paid, but 
one or two other species of Protestant dissenters. 
The consequence has been loyalty and peace. This 
way of appeasing dissenters you may call expensive, 
but is there no expense in injustice ? You have at 
this moment an army of 20,000 men in Ireland, horse, 
foot, and artillery, at an annual expense of a million 
and a half of money ; about one third of this sum 
would be the expense of the allowance to the Catholic 
clergy ; and this army is so necessary, that the gov- 



* I say almost, because I hate to overstate an argument, 
and it is impossible to deny that there is danger to a church 
to which seven millions contribute largely, and in which 
six millions disbelieve : my argument merely is, that such a 
church would be more safe in proportion as it interfered 
less with the comforts and ease of its natural enemies, and 
rendered their position more desirable and agreeable. I 
firmly believe the Toleration Act to be quite as conducive 
to the security of the Church of England as it is to the dis- 
senters. Perfect toleration and the abolition of every in- 
capacity as a consequence of religious opinions, are not, 
what is commonly called, a receipt for innovation, but a 
receipt for the quiet and permanence of every estabish- 
ment which has the real good sense to adopt it. 



I ernment dare not at this moment remove a single regi. 

j ment from Ireland. Abolish these absurd and dis» 

I graceful distinctions, and a few troops of horse to help 

the constables on fair days will be more than sufficient 

for the Catholic limb of the empire. 

Now for a very few of the shameful misrepresenta- 
tions circulated respecting the Irish Catholics, for I 
repeat again that we have nothing to do with Spanish 
or Italian, but with Irish Catholics ; it is not true that 
the Irish Catholics refuse to circulate the Bible in Eng- 
lish ; on the contrary, they have in Ireland circulated 
several editions of the Scriptures in English. In the 
last year, the Catholic prelates prepared and put forth 
a stereotype edition of the Bible, of a small print and 
low price, to insure its general circulation. They cir- 
culate the Bible with their own notes, and how, as 
Catholics, can they act otherwise ? Are not our pre- 
lates and Bartlett's buildings acting in the same man- 
ner ? And must not all churches, if they are consist- 
ent, act in the same manner ? The Bibles Catholics 
quarrel with, are Protestant Bibles without notes, or 
Protestant Bibles with Protestant notes, and how can 
they do otherwise without giving up their religion ? — 
They deny, upon oath, that the infallibility of the pope 
is any necessary part of the Catholic faith. They, up- 
on oath, declare that Catholic people are forbidden to 
worship images, and saints, and relics. They, upon 
oath, abjure the temporal power of the pope, or his 
right to absolve any Catholic from his oath. They 
renounce, upon oath, all right to forfeit lands, and cov- 
enant upon oath, not to destroy or plot against the 
Irish Protestant Church. What more can any man 
want whom any thing will content? 

Some people talk as if they were quite teased and 
worried by the eternal clamours of* the Catholics ; but 
if you are eternally unjust, can you expect anything 
more than to be eternally vexed by the victims of your 
injustice ? You want all the luxury of oppression 
without any of its inconvenience. I should think the 
Catholics very much to blame, if they ever ceased to 
importune the legislature for justice, so long as they 
could find one single member of Parliament who would 
advocate their cause. 

The putting the matter to rest by an effort of the 
county of York, or by any decision of Parliament 
against them, is utterly hopeless. Every year in- 
creases the Catholic population, and the Catholic 
wealth, and the Catholic claims, till you are caught in 
one of those political attitudes to which all countries 
are occasionally exposed, in which you are utterly 
helpless, and must give way to their claims ; and if 
yom do it then, you will do it badly ; you may call it 
an arrangement, but arrangements made at such times 
are much like the bargains between an highwayman 
and a traveller, a pistol on one side, and a purse on 
the other; the rapid scramble of armed violence, and 
the unqualified surrender of helpless timidity. If you 
think the thing must be done at some time or another, do 
it when you are calm and powerful, and when you need 
not do it. 

There are a set of high-spirited men who are very 
much afraid of being afraid ; who cannot brook the 
idea of doing any thing from fear, and whose conver- 
sation is full of fire and sword, when any apprehen- 
sion of resistance is alluded to. I have a perfect con- 
fidence in the high and unyielding spirit, and in the 
military courage of the English ; and I have no doubt 
but that many of the country gentlemen, who now call 
out no Popery, would fearlessly put themselves at the 
head of their embattled yeomanry, to control the Irish 
Catholics. My objection to such courage is, that it 
would certainly be exercised unjustly, and probably 
exercised in vain. I should deprecate any rising of the 
Catholics as the most grievous misfortune which could 
happen to the empire and to themselves. They had 
far better endure all they do endure, and a great deal 
worse, than try the experiment. But if they do try it, 
you may depend upon it, they will do it at their own 
time, and not at yours. They will not select a fortnight 
in the summer, during a profound peace, when corn 
and money abound, and when the Catholics of Europe 
are unconcerned spectators. If you make a resolute* 
to be unjust, you must make another resolution to wi 



302 



WORKS OF THE REV. SIDNEY SMITH. 



always strong, always vigilant, and always rich; you 
must commit no blunders, exhibit no deficiencies, and 
meet with no misfortunes ; you must present a square 
phalanx of impenetrable strength, for keen-eyed re- 
venge is riding round your ranks ; and if one heart fal- 
ters, or one hand trembles, you are lost. 

You may call all this threatening ; I am sure I have 
no such absurd intention ; but wish only, in sober sad- 
ness, to point out what appears to me to be the inevi- 
table consequences of the conduct we pursue. If dan- 
ger be not pointed out and insisted upon, how is it to 
be avoided/ My firm belief is, that England will be 
compelled to grant ignominiously what she now re- 
fuses haughtily. Remember what happened respect- 
ing Ireland in the American war. In 1779, the Irish, 
whose trade was completely restricted by English 
laws, asked for some little relaxation, some liberty to 
export her own products, and to import the products 
of other countries ; their petition was flung out of the 
House with the utmost disdain, and by an immense 
majority. In April, 17S2, 70,000 Irish volunteers were 
under arms, the representatives of 170 armed corps 
met at Ulster, and the English Parliament (the Lords 
and Commons both on the same day and with only one 
dissentient voice, the ministers moving the question) 
were compelled, in the most disgraceful and precipi- 
tate manner, to acknowledge the complete indepen- 
dance of the Irish nation, and nothing but the good 
sense and moderation o/Grattan prevented the separation 
of the two crowns. 

It is no part of my province to defend every error 
of the Catholic church : I believe it has many errors, 
though I am sure these errors are grievously exagge- 
rated and misrepresented. I should think it a vast 
accession to the happiness of mankind, if every Catho- 
lic in Europe were converted to the Protestant faith. 
The question is not, whether there shall be Catholics, 
but the question (as they do exist and you cannot get 
rid of them) is, what are you to do with them ? Are 
you to make men rebels because you cannot make 
them Protestants ? and are you to endanger your state 
because you cannot enlarge your church? England is 
the ark of liberty : the English Church I believe to be 
one of the best establishments in the world ; but what 
is to become of England, of its church, its free insti- 
tutions, and the beautiful political model it holds out 
to mankind, if Ireland should succeed in connecting 
itself with any other European power hostile to Eng- 
land ? I join in the cry of no Popery as lustily as any 
man in the streets who does not know whether the 
pope lives in Cumberland or Westmoreland; but I 
know that it is impossible to keep down European 
Popery, and European tyranny, without the assistance 
or with the opposition of Ireland. If you give the Irish 
their privileges, the spirit of the nation will overcome 
the spirit of the church ; they will cheerfully serve 
you against all enemies, and chant a Te Deum for 
your victories over all the Catholic armies of Europe. 
If it be true, as her enemies say, that the Roman Ca- 
tholic church is waging war all over Europe against 
common sense, against public liberty ; selling the peo- 
ple to the kings and nobles, and labouring for the few 
against the many ; all this is an additional reason why 
I would fortify England and Protestantism by every 
concession to Ireland : why I should take care that 
our attention was not distracted, nor our strength 
wasted by internal dissension ; why I would not para- 
lyze those arms which wield the sword of justice 
among the nations of the world, and lift up the buck- 
ler of safety. If the Catholic religion in Ireland is an 
abuse, you must tolerate that abuse, to prevent its 
extension and tyranny over the rest of Europe. If you 
will take a long view instead of a confined view, and 
look generally to the increase of human happiness, 
the best check upon the increase of Popery, the best secu- 
rity for the establishment of the Protestant Church is, 
that the British empire shall be preserved in a state of 
the greatest strength, union, and opulence. My cry, 
then, is, no Popery ; therefore emancipate the Catho- 
lics, that they may not join with foreign Papists in 
time of war. Church for ever; therefore emancipate 
-he Catholics, that they may not help to pull it down. 
King for ever; therefore emancipate the Catholics, 



that they may become his loyal subjects. Great Bri- 
tain for ever ; therefore emancipate the Catholics, that 
they may not put an end to its perpetuity. Our govern- 
ment is essentially Protestant ; therefore, by emancipa- 
ting the Catholics, give up a few circumstances which 
have nothing to do with the essence. The Catholics 
are disguised enemies; therefore, by emancipation, 
turn them into open friends. They have a double alle- 
giance ; therefore, by emancipation, make their alle- 
giance to their king so grateful, that they will never 
confound it with the spiritual allegiance to their pope. 
It is very difficult for electors, who are much occupied 
by other matters, to choose the right path amid the 
rage and fury of faction ; but I give you one mark — 
vote for a free altar; give what the law compels you to 
give to the establishment ; (that done,) no chains, no 
prisons, no bonfires for a man's faith; and above all, 
no modem chains and prisons under the names of dis- 
qualifications and incapacities, which are only the cru- 
elty and tyranny of a more civilized age; civil offices 
open to all, a Catholic or a Protestant alderman, a 
Moravian, or a Church jof Englaud, or a Wesleyan 
justice, no oppression, no tyranny in belief: a free altar, 
an open road to heaven ; no human insolence, no human 
narrowness, hallowed by the name of God. 

Every man in trade must have experienced the dif- 
ficulty of getting m a bill from an unwilling paymaster 
If you call in the morning, the gentleman is not up 
if in the middle of the day, he is out ; if in the even 
ing, there is company. If you ask mildly, you are in- 
different to the time of payment ; if you press, you 
are impertinent. No time and no manner can render 
such a message agreeable. So it is with the poor Ca- 
tholics ; their message is so disagreeable, that their 
time and manner can never be right. ' Not this ses 
sion. Not now ; on no account at the present time 
any other time than this. The great mass of the Ca- 
tholics are so torpid on the subject, that the question 
is clearly confined to the ambition of the few, or the 
whole Catholic population are so leagued together, 
that the object is clearly to intimidate the mother- 
country.' In short, the Catholics want justice, and 
Ave do not mean to be just, and the most specious me- 
thod of refusal is, to have it believed that they are 
refused from their own folly, and not from our fault. 

What if O'Connell (a man certainty of extraordina- 
ry talents and eloquence) is sometimes violent and in- 
judicious? What if O'Gorman or O'Sullivan have 
spoken ill of the Reformation? Is it a great stroke of 
national policy to depend on such childish considera- 
tions as these ? If these chains ought to remain, 
could I be induced to remove them by the chaste lan- 
guage and humble deportment of him who wears 
them? If they ought to be struck away, would I 
continue them, because my taste was offended by the 
coarse insolence of a goaded and injured captive ? 
Would I make that great measure to depend on the 
irritability of my own feelings, which ought to depend 
upon policy and justice? The more violent and the 
more absurd the conduct of the Catholics, the greaiei 
the wisdom of emancipation. If they were always go 
vemed by men of consummate prudence and modera- 
tion, your justice in refusing would be the same, but 
your danger would be less. The levity and irritability 
of the Irish character are pressing reasons why all just 
causes of provocation should be taken away, and those 
high passions enlisted in the service of the empire. 

In talking of the spirit of the papal empire, it is of- 
ten argued that the will remains the same ; that the 
pontiff would, if he could, exercise the same influence 
in Europe ; that the Catholic Church would, if it could, 
tyrannize over the rights and opinions of mankind? 
but if the power is taken away, what signifies the 
will ? If the pope thunders in vain against the king- 
doms of the earth, of what consequence is his disposi- 
tion to thunder? If mankind are too enlightened and 
too humane to submit to the cruelties and hatreds of a 
Catholic priesthood ; if the Protestants of the empire 
are sufficiently strong to resist it, why are we to alarm 
ourselves with the barren volition, unseconded by the 
requisite power ? I hardly know in what order or de. 
scription of men I should choose to confide, if they 
could do as they would; the best security is, thac the 



CATHOLIC QUESTION. 



303 



rest of the world will not let them do as they wish to 
to do ; and having satisfied myself of this, I am not 
very careful about the rest. 

Our government is called essentially Protestant ; 
but if it be essentially Protestant in the imposition of 
taxes, it should be essentially Protestant in the dis- 
tribution of offices. The treasury is open to all religi- 
ons, Parliament only to one. The tax-gatherer is the 
most indulgent and liberal of human beings : he ex- 
cludes no creed, imposes no articles ; but counts Ca- 
tholic cash, pockets Protestant paper; and is candidly 
and impartially oppressive to every description of the 
Christian world. Can any thing be more base than 
when you want the blood or the money of the Catho- 
lics, to forget that they are Catholics, and to remem- 
ber only that they are British subjects ; and when 
they ask for the benefits of the British constitution, to 
remember only that they are Catholics, and to forget 
that they are British subjects ? 

No Popery, was the cry of the great English Revo- 
lution, because the increase and prevalence of Popery 
in England would, at that period, have rendered this 
island tributary to France. The Irish Catholics were, 
at that period, broken to pieces by the severity and 
military execution of Cromwell, and by the penal laws. 
They are since become a great and formidable people. 
The same dread of foreign influence makes it now ne- 
cessary that they should be restored to political rights. 
Must the friends of rational liberty join in a clamour 
against the Catholics now, because, in a very different 
state of the world, they excited that clamour a hun- 
dred years ago ? I remember a house near Battersea 
Bridge which caught fire, and there was a general cry 
of ' Water, water ." Ten years after, the Thames 
rose, and the people of the house were nearly drowned. 
Would it not have been rather singular to have said 
to the inhabitants, ' I heard you calling for water ten 
years ago, why don't you call for it now V 

There are some men who think the present times so 
incapable of forming any opinions, that they are al- 
ways looking back to the wisdom of our ancestors. 
Now, as the Catholics sat in the English parliament to 
the reign of Charles II. and in the Irish Parliament, I 
believe, till the reign of King William, the precedents 
are more in their favour than otherwise ; and to re- 
place them in Parliament seems rather to return to, 
than to deviate from, the practice of our ancestors. 

If the Catholics are priest-ridden, pamper the rider, 
and he will not stick so close ; don't torment the ani- 
mal ridden, and his violence will be less dangerous. 

The strongest evidence against the Catholics is that 
of Colonel John Irvine ; he puts every thing against 
them in the strongest light, and Colonel John (with 
great actual, though, I am sure, with no intentional 
exaggeration) does not pretend to say there would be 
more than forty-six members returned for Ireland who 
were Catholics ; but how many members are there in 
the House now returned by catholics, and compelled, 
from the fear of losing their seats, to vote in favour 
of every measure which concerns the Catholic Church ? 
The Catholic party, as the colonel justly observes, 
was formed when you admitted them to the elective 
franchise. The Catholic party are increasing so much 
in boldness, that they will soon require of the mem- 
bers they return, to oppose generally any government 
hostile to Catholic emancipation, and they will turn out 
those who do not comply with this rule. If this is 
done, the phalanx so much dreaded from emancipa- 
tion is found at once without emancipation. This con- 
sequence of resistance to the Catholic claims is well 
worth the attention of those who make use of the cry 
of no Popery, as a mere political engine. 

We are taunted with our prophetical spirit, because 
it is said by the advocates of the Catholic question 
that the thing must come to pass ; that it is inevita- 
ble : our prophecy, however, is founded upon experi- 
ence and common sense, and is nothing more than 
the application of the past to the future. In a few 
years time, when the madness and wretchedness of war 
are forgotten, when the greater part of those who have 
lost in war, legs and arms, health and sons, have gone 
to their graves, the same scenes will be acted over 
again in the world. France, Spain, Russia and Amer- 



ica, will be upon us. Tl e Catholics will watch their 
opportunity, and soon settle the question of Catholic 
emancipation. To suppose that any nation can go on 
in the midst of foreign wars, denying common justice 
to seven millions of men, in the heart of the empire, 
awakened to their situation, and watching for the crit- 
ical moment of redress, does, I confess, appear to me 
to be the height of extravagance. To foretell the con- 
sequence of such causes, in my humble apprehension, 
demands no more of shrewdness than to point out the 
probable results of leaving a lighted candle stuck up 
in an open barrel of gunpowder. 

It is very difficult to make the mass of mankind be- 
lieve that the state of things is ever to be otherwise 
than they have been accustomed to see it. I have 
very often heard old persons describe the impossibili- 
ty of making anyone believe that the American colo- 
nies could ever be separated from this country. It 
was always considered as an idle dream of discontent- 
ed politicians, good enough to fill up the periods of a 
speech, but which no practical man, devoid of the spi- 
rit of party, considered to be within the limits of pos- 
sibility. There was a period when the slightest con- 
cession would have satisfied the Americans ; but all 
the world was in heroics , one set of gentlemen met at 
the Lamb, and another at the Lion ; blood and treasure 
men, breathing war, vengeance, and contempt ; and in 
eight years afterwards, an awkward-looking gentle- 
man in plain clothes walked up to the drawing-room 
of St. James's, in the midst of the gentlemen of the 
Lion and Lamb, and was introduced as the Ambassador 
from the United States of America. 

You must forgive me if I draw illustrations from 
common things — but in seeing swine driven, I have 
often thought of the Catholic question, and of the dif- 
ferent methods of governing mankind. The object, 
one day, was to drive some of these animals along a 
path to a field where they had not been before. The 
man could by no means succeed ; instead of turning 
their faces to the north, and proceeding quietly along, 
they made for the east and west, rushed back to the 
south, and positively refused to advance ; a reinforce- 
ment of rustics was called for ; maids, children, neigh- 
bours, all helped ; a general rushing, screaming, and 
roaring ensued ; but the main object' was not in the 
slightest degree advanced. After a long delay, we 
resolved (though an hour before we should have dis- 
dained such a compromise) to have recourse to Catho- 
lic emancipation ; a little boy was sent before them 
with a handful of barley ; a few grains were scattered 
in the path, and the bristly herd were speedily and 
safely conducted to the place of their destination. If, 
instead of putting Lord Stowell out of breath with dri- 
ving — compelling the Duke of York to swear, and the 
chancellor to strike at them with the mace, Lord Li- 
verpool would condescend, in his graceful manner, to 
walk before the Catholic doctors with a basket of bar- 
ley, what a deal of ink and blood would be saved to 
mankind. 

Because the Catholics are intolerant we uHll be intole- 
rant ; but did any body ever hear before that a govern- 
ment is to imitate the vices of its subjects? If the 
Irish were a rash, violent, and intemperate race, are 
they to be treated with rashness, violence, and intem- 
perance ? If they were addicted to fraud and falsehood, 
are they to be treated by those who rule them with 
fraud and falsehood? Are there to be perpetual races 
in error and vice between the people and the lords of 
the people ? Is the supreme power always to find vir- 
tues among the people ; never to teach them by exam- 
ple, or improve them by laws and institutions ? Make 
all sects free, and let them learn the value of the bless- 
ing to others by their own enjoyment of it ; but if not, 
let them learn it by your vigilance and firm resistance 
to every thing intolerant. Toleration will then be- 
come a habit and a practice ingrafted upon the man- 
ners of a people, when they find the law too strong for 
them, and that there is no use in being intolerant. 

It is very true that the Catholics have a double alle- 
giance,* but it is equally true that their second or spi- 

* The same double allegiance exists in every Catholic 
country in Europe, The spiritual head of the country 



304 



WORKS OF THE RE\ . SIDNEY SMITH 



ritual allegiance has nothing to do with civil policy, 
and does not, in the most distant manner, interfere 
with their allegiance to the crown. What is meant by 



do not accuse them of intentional cruelty and in- 
justice ; I am sure there are very many excellent men 
who would be shocked if they could conceive them- 



allegiance to the crown, is, I presume, obedience to \ selves to be guilty of any thing like cruelty ; but they 



acts of Parliament, and a resistance to those who are 
constitutionally proclaimed to be the enemies of the 
country. I have seen and heard of no instance, for this 
century and a half last past, where the spiritual sove- 
reign has presumed to meddle with the affairs of the 
temporal sovereign . The Catholics deny him such 
power by the most solemn oaths which the wit of man 
can devise. In every war, the army and navy are full 
of Catholic officers and soldiers ; and if their allegiance 
in temporal matters is unimpeachable and unimpeach- 
ed, what matters to whom they choose to pay spiritu- 
al obedience, and to adopt as their guide in genuflexion 
and psalmody ? Suppose these same Catholics were 
foolish enough to be governed by a set of Chinese mo- 
ralists in their diet, this would be a third allegiance ; 
and if they were regulated by Brahmins in their dress, 
this would be a fourth allegiance ; and if they received 
the directions of the Patriarch of the Greek Church in 
educating their children, here is another allegiance: 
and as long as they fought, and paid taxes, and kept 
clear of the quarter sessions and assizes, what matters 
how many fanciful supremacies and frivolous allegian- 
ces they choose to manufacture or accumulate for 
themselves ? 

A great deal of time would be spared, if gentlemen, 
before they ordered their post-chaises for a no-Popery 
meeting, would read the most elementary defence of 
these people, and inform themselves even of the rudi- 
ments of the question. If the Catholics meditate the 
resumption of the Catholic property, why do they 
purchase that which they know (if the fondest object 
of their political life succeed) must be taken away 
from them ? Why is not an attempt made to purchase 
a quietus from the rebel who is watching the blessed 
revolutionary moment for regaining his possessions, 
and revelling in the unbounded sensuality of mealy 
and waxy enjoyments? But after all, who are the 
descendants of the rightful possessors ? The estate 
belonged to the O'Rourkes, who were hanged, drawn, 
and quartered in the time of Cromwell; true, but 
before that, it belonged to the O'Connors, who were 
hanged, drawn, and quartered in the time of Henry VII. 
The O'Sullivan's have a still earlier plea of suspension, 
evisceration, and division. Who is the rightful posses- 
sor of the estate ? We forget that Catholic Ireland 
has been murdered three times over by its Protestant 
masters. 

Mild and genteel people do not like the idea of per- 
secution, and are advocates for toleration ; but then 
they think it no act of intolerance to deprive Catholics 
of political power. The history of all this is, that all 
men secretly like to punish others for not being of the 
same opinion with themselves, and that this sort of 
privation is the only species of persecution, of which 
the improved feeling and advanced cultivation of the 
age will admit. Fire and fagot, chains and stone 
walls, have been clamoured away ; nothing remains 
but to mortify a man's pride, and to limit his resources, 
and to set a mark upon him, by cutting him off from 
his fair share of political power. By this receipt, in- 
solence is gratified, and humanity is not shocked. 
The gentlest Protestant can see, with dry eyes, Lord 
Stourton excluded from Parliament, though he would 
abominate the most distant idea of personal cruelty 
to Mr. Petre. This is only to say that he lives in the 
nineteenth, instead of the sixteenth century, and that 
he is as intolerant in religious matters as the state of 
manners existing in his age will permit. Is it not the 
same spirit which wounds the pride of a fellow-crea- 
ture on account of his faith, or which casts his body 
into the flames? Are they any thing else but de- 
grees and modifications of the same principle ? The 
minds of these two men no more differ because they 
differ in their degrees of puuishment, than their bodies 
differ, because one wore a doublet in the time of Mary, 
and the other wears a coat in the reign of George. I 

among French, Spanish, and Austrian catholics, is the 
pope; the political head, the king or emperor. 



innocently give a wrong name to the bad spirit which 
is within them, and think they are tolerant, because 
they are not as intolerant as they could have been in 
other times, but cannot be now. The true spirit is to 
search after God and for another life Avith lowliness 
of heart; to fling down no man's altar, to punish no 
man's prayer ; to heap no penalties and no pains on 
those solemn supplications which, in divers tongues, 
and in varied forms, and in temples of a thousand 
shapes, but with one deep sense of human dependence, 
men pour forth to God. 

It is completely untrue that the Catholic religion is 
what it was three centuries ago, or that it is unchange- 
able and unchanged. These are mere words, without 
the shadow of truth to support them. If the pope 
were to address a bull to the kingdom of Ireland, ex- 
communicating the Duke of York, and cutting him off 
from the succession, for his Protestant effusion in the 
House of Lords, he would be laughed at as a lunatic 
in all the Catholic chapels in Dublin. The Catholics 
would not now burn Protestants as heretics. In many 
parts of Europe, Catholics and Protestants worship in 
one church — Catholics at eleven, Protestants at one ; 
they sit in the same Parliament, are elected to the 
same office, live together without hatred or friction, 
under equal laws. Who can see and know these 
things, and say that the Catholic religion is unchange- 
able and unchanged? 

I have often endeavoured to reflect upon the causes 
which, from time to time, raised such a clamour 
against the Catholics, and I think the following are 
among the most conspicuous : — 

1. Historical recollections of the cruelties inflicted 
upon the Protestants. 

2. Theological differences. 

3. A belief that the Catholics are unfriendly to 
liberty. 

4. That their morality is not good. 

5. That they meditate the destruction of the Pro 
testant Church. 

6. An unprincipled clamour by men who have no 
sort of belief in the danger of emancipation ; but who 
make use of no Popery as a political engine. 

7. A mean and selfish spirit of denying to others 
the advantages we ourselves enjoy. 

8. A vindictive spirit or love of punishing others, 
who offend our self-love by presuming, on important 
points, to entertain opinions opposite to our own. 

9. Stupid compliance with the opinions of the ma- 
jority. 

10. To these I must, in justice and candour add, as 
a tenth cause, a real apprehension on the part of hon- 
est and reasonable men, that it is dangerous to grant 
farther concessions to the Catholics. 

To these various causes I shall make a short reply, 
in the order in which I have placed them. 

1. Mere historical recollections are very miserable 
reasons for the continuation of penal and incapacitat- 
ing laws, and one side has as much to recollect as the 
other. 

2. The state has nothing to do with questions purely 
theological. 

3. It is ill to say this in a country whose free insti- 
tutions were founded by Catholics, and it is often said 
by men who care nothing about free institutions. 

4. It is not true. 

5. Make their situation so comfortable, that it will 
not be worth their while to attempt an enterprise so 
desperate. 

6. This is an unfair political trick, because it is too 
dangerous ; it is spoiling the table in order to win the 
game. 

The 7th and Sth causes exercise a great share of in- 
fluence in every act of intolerance. The 9th must, of 
course, comprehend the greatest number. 

10. Of the existence of such a clsss of no Poperists 
as this, it would be the height of injustice to doubt, 
but I confess it excites in me a very great degree ot 
astonishment. 



CATHOLIC QUESTION. 



305 



Suppose after a severe struggle, you put the Irish I 
down, if they are mad and foolish enough to recur to | 
open violence ; yet are the retarded industry, and the 
misapplied energies of so many millions of men to go 
for nothing ? Is it possible to forget all the wealth, 
peace, and happiness which are to be sacrificed for 
twenty years to come, to these pestilential and dis- 
graceful squabbles ? Is there no horror in looking 
forward to a long period in which men, instead of 
ploughing and spinning, will curse and hate, and burn 
and murder. 

There seems to me a sort of injustice and impro- 
priety in our deciding at all upon the Catholic ques- 
tion. It should be left to those Irish Protestants 
whose shutters are bullet proof; whose dinner-table 
is regularly spread with knife, fork, and cocked pistol ; 
salt cellar and powder-flask. Let the opinion of those 
persons be resorted to, who sleep in sheet-iron 
night-caps ; who have fought so often and so nobly 
before their scullery door, and defended the parlour 
passage as bravely as Leonidas delended the pass of 
Thermopylae. The Irish Protestant members see and 
know the state of their own country. Let their votes 
decide* the case. "We are quiet and at peace ; our 
homes may be defended with a feather, and our doors 
fastened with a pin ; and as ignorant of what armed 
3nd insulted Popery is, as we are of the state of New 
Zealand, we pretend to regulate by our clamours the 
religious factions of Ireland. 

It is a very pleasant thing to trample upon Catho- 
lics, and it is also a very pleasant thing to have an im- 
mense number of pheasants running about your Avoods ; 
but there come thirty or forty poachers in the night, 
and fight with thirty or forty game preservers ; some 
are killed, some fractured, some scalped, some maimed 
for life. Poachers are caught up and hanged ; a vast 
body of hatred and revenge accumulates in the neigh- 
bourhood of the great man ; and he says < the sport is 
not worth the candle. The preservation of game is a 
very agreeable thing, but I will not sacrifice the hap- 
piness of my life to it. This amusement, like any 
other, may be purchased too dearly.' So it is with 
the Irish Protestants ; they are finding out that Catho- 
lic exclusion may be purchased too dearly. Maimed 
cattle, fired ricks, threatening letters, barricadoed 
houses, to endure all this ; is to purchase superiority at 
too dear a rate, and this is the inevitable state of two 
parties, the one of whom are unwilling to relinquish 
their ancient monopoly of power, while the other 
party have, at length discovered their strength, and 
are determined to be free. 

Gentlemen (with the best intentions, I am sure,) 
meet together in a country town, and enter into reso- 
lutions that no farther concessions are to be made to 
the Catholics ; but if you will not let them into Parlia- 
ment, why not allow them to be king's counsel, or ser- 
geants at law ? Why are they excluded by law from 
some corporations in Ireland, and admissible, though 
not admitted, to others ? I think, before such general 
resolutions of exclusion are adopted, and the rights 
and happiness of so many millions of people disposed 
of, it would be decent and proper to obtain some toler- 
able information of what the present state of the Irish 
Catholics is, and of the vast number of insignificant 
offices from which they are excluded. Keep them 
from Parliament, if you think it right, but ao not, 
therefore, exclude them from any thing else, to which 
you think Catholics may be fairly admitted without 
danger, and as to their content or discontent, there 
can be no sort of reason why discontent should not be 
lessened, though it cannot be removed. 

You are shocked by the present violence and abuse 
used by the Irish Association ; by whom are they 
driven to it? and whom are you to thank for it? Is 
there a hope left to them? Is any term of endurance 
alluded to ? any scope or boundary to their patience ? 
Is the minister waiting for opportunities ? have they 
reason to believe that they are wished well to by the 
greatest of the great? Have they brighter hopes in 
another reign ? Is there one clear spot in the horizon ? 

* A great majority of Irish members voted for Catholic 
emancipation. 



any thing that you have left to them, but that disgust, 
hatred and despair, which, breaking out into Wild elo- 
quence, and acting upon a wild people, are preparing 
every day a mass of treason and disaffection, which 
may shake this empire to its very centre ? and you 
may laugh at Daniel O'Connell, and treat him with 
contempt, and turn his metaphors into ridicule ; but 
Daniel has, after all, a great deal of real and powerful 
eloquence ; and a strange sort of misgiving sometimes 
comes across me, that Daniel and the doctor are not 
quite so great fools as many most respectable country 
clergymen believe them to be. 

You talk of their abuse of the Reformation, but is 
there any end to the obloquy and abuse with which 
the Catholics are upon every point, and from every 
quarter, assailed? Is there any one folly, vice, or 
crime, which the blind fury of Protestants does not 
lavish upon them ? and do you suppose all this is to 
be heard in silence, and without retaliation? Abuse 
as much as you please, if you are going to emancipate, 
but if you intend to do nothing for the Catholics but to 
call them names, you must not be put out of temper if 
you receive a few ugly appellations in return. 

The great object of men who love party better than 
truth, is to have it believed that the Catholics alone 
have been persecutors ; but what can be more flag- 
rantly unjust than to take our notions of history only 
from the conquering and triumphant party ? If you 
think the Catholics have not their Book of Martyrs as 
well as the Protestants, take the following enumera- 
tion of some of their most learned and careful writers. 
The whole number of Catholics who have suffered death in 
England for the exercise of the Roman Catholic religion 
since the Reformation : 

Henry VIII. ----- 59 

Elizabeth 204 

James I. 25 

Charles I. and > .- - - 23 

Commonwealth 5 

Charles II. 8 



Total 



319 



Henry VIII. with consummate impartiality, burnt 
three Protestants and hanged four Catholics for differ- 
ent errors in religion on the same day and the same 
place. Elizabeth burnt two Dutch Anabaptists for 
some theological tenets, July 22, 1575, Fox the mar- 
tyrologist vainly pleading with the queen in their 
favour. In 1579, the same Protestant queen cut off 
the hand of Stubbs, the author of a tract against 
popish connection, of Singleton, the printer, and Page 
the disperser of the book. Camden saw it done. 
Warburton properly says it exceeds in cruelty any 
thing done by Charles I. On the 4th of June, Mr. 
Elias Thacker and Mr. John Capper, two ministers of 
the Brownist persuasion, were hanged at St. Edmunds- 
bury, for dispersing books against the Common Prayer 
With respect to the great part of the Catholic victims 
the law was fully and literally executed ; after being 
hanged up, they were cut down alive, dismembered, 
ripped up, and their bowels burnt before their faces* 
after which, they were beheaded and quartered. The 
time employed in this butchery was very consider- 
able, and, in one instance, lasted more than half an 
hour. 

The uncandid excuse for all this is, that the greater 
part of these men were put to death for political, not 
for religious crimes. That is, a law is first passed 
making it high treason for a priest to exercise his func- 
tion in England, and so, when he is caught and burnt, 
this is not religious persecution, but an offence against 
the state. We are, I hope, all too busy to need any 
answer to such childish uncandid reasoning as this. 

The total number of those who suffered capitally in 
the reign of Elizabeth, is stated by Dodd, in his Church 
History,* to be one hundred and ninety-nine ; further 



* The total number of sufferers in the reign of Queen 
Mary, varies, I believe, from 200 in the Catholic to 280 in 
the Protestant accounts. I recommend all young men who 
wish to form some notion of what answer the Catholics 
have to make, to read Milner's 'Letters to a Prebendary,' 
and to follow the line of reading to which his references 
lead. They will then learn the importance of that sacred 
maxim, Audi alteram partem- 



306 



WORKS OF THE REV. SIDNEY SMITH. 



inquiries made their number to be two hundred and 
four ; fifteen of these were condemned for denying the 
queen's supremacy ; one hundred aud twenty-six for 
the exercise of priestly functions ; and the others for 
being reconciled to the Catholic faith, or for aiding 
and assisting priests. In this list, no person is inclu- 
ded who was executed for any plot, real or imaginary, 
except eleven, who suffered for the pretended plot of 
Rheims ; a pJot, which Dr. Milner justly observes, 
was so daring a forgery, that even Camden allows the 
sufferers to have been political victims. Besides these, 
mention is made in the same work of ninety Catholic 
priests, or laymen, who died in prison in the same 
reign. < About the same time,' he says, • I find fifty 
gentlemen lying prisoners in York Castle ; most of 
them perished there, of vermin, famine, hunger, thirst, 
dirt, damp, fever, whipping, and broken hearts, the 
inseparable circumstances of prisons in those days. 
These were every week, for a twelve-month together, 
dragged by main force to hear the established service 
performed in the castle chapel.' The Catholics were 
frequently, during the reign of Elizabeth, tortured in 
the most dreadful manner. In order to extort answers 
from father Campion, he was laid on the rack, and 
his limbs stretched a little, to show him, as the exe- 
cutioner termed it, what the rack was. He persisted 
in his refusal; then, for several days successively, the 
torture was increased, and on the last two occasions 
he was so cruelly rent and torn, that he expected to 
expire under the torment. While under ihe rack, he 
called continually upon God. In the reign of the Pro- 
testant Edward VI., Joan Knell was burnt to death, 
and the year after, George Parry was burnt also. In 
1575, two Protestants, Peterson and Turwort, (as be- 
fore stated,) were burnt to death by Elizabeth. In 
1589, under the same queen, Lewes, a Protestant, was 
burnt to death at Norwich, where Francis Kett was 
also burnt for religious opinions in 1569, under the 
same great queen, who, in 1591, hanged the Protest- 
ant Hacket for heresy, in Cheapside. and put to death 
Greenwood, Barrow, and Penry, for being Brownists. 
Southwell, a Catholic, was racked ten times during the 
reign of this sister of bloody Queen Mary. In 1592, 
Mrs. Ward was hanged, drawn, and quartered for as- 
sisting a Catholic priest to escape in a box. Mrs. 
Lyne suiiered the same punishment for harbouring a 
priest ; and in 15S6, Mrs. Ciitheroe, who was accused 
of relieving a priest, and refused to plead, was pressed 
to death in York Castle ; a sharp stone being placed 
underneath her back. 

Have not Protestants persecuted both Catholics and 
their fellow Protestants in Germany, Switzerland, Ge- 
neva, France, Holland, Sweden, and England? Look 
to the atrocious punishment of Leighton under Laud, 
for writing against prelacy ; first, his ear was cut off, 
then his nose slit, then the other ear cut off', then 
whipped, then whipped again. Look to the horrible 
cruelties exercised by the Protestant Episcopalians on 
the Scottish Presbyterians, in the reign of Charles II., 
of whom 8000 are said to have perished in that persecu- 
tion. Persecutions of Protestants by Protestants, are 
amply detailed by Chandler, in his History of Perse- 
cution ; by Ncal, in his History of the Puritans; by 
Laing, in his History of Scotland ; by Penn, in his Life 
of Fox; and in Brandt's History of' the Reformation 
in the Low Countries ; which furnishes many very ter- 
rible cases of the sufferings of the Anabaptists and 
Remonstrants. In 1560, the Parliament of Scotland 
decreed, at one and the same time, the establishment 
of Calvinism, and the punishment of death against the 
ancient religion : < With such indecent haste (says 
Robertson) did the very persons who had just escaped 
ecclesiastical tyranny, proceed to imitate their ex- 
ample.' Nothing can be so absurd as to suppose, 
that in barbarous ages, the excesses were all commit- 
ted bv one religious party, and none by the other. 
The Huguenots of France burnt churches, and hung 
priests wherever they found them. Froumenteau, one 
of their own writers, confesses, that in the single prov- 
ince of Dauphiny, they killed two hundred and twenty 
?riests, and one hundred and twelve friars. In the 
,ow Countries, wherever Vandemerk and Sonoi, lieu- 
tenants of the Prince of Orange, carried their arms, 



they uniformly put to death, and in cold blood, all the 
priests and religious they could lay their hands on. 
The Protestant Servetus was put to death by the Pro- 
testants of Geneva, for denying the doctrine of the 
Trinity, as the Protestant Gentilis was, on the same 
score, by those of Berne ; add to these, Felix Mans, 
Rotman, and Barnevald. Of Servetus, Melancthon, 
the mildest of men, declared that he deserved to have 
his bowels pulled out, and his body torn to pieces. 
The last fires of persecution which were lighted in 
England, were by Protestants. Bartholomew Legate, 
an Arian, was burnt by order of King James in Smith- 
field, on the 18th of March, 1612; on the 11th of 
April, in the same year, Edward Weightman was 
burnt at Litchfield, by order of the Protestant Bishop 
of Litchfield and' Coventry ; and this man was, I be- 
lieve, the last person who was burnt in England for 
heresy. There was another condemned to the fire for 
the same heresy, but as pity was excited by the con- 
stancy of these sufferers, it was thought better to al- 
low him to linger on a miserable life in Newgate. 
Fuller, who wrote in the reign of Charles II., and was 
a zealous Church of England man, speaking of the 
burnings in question, says, i It may appear that God 
was well pleased with them.' 

There are, however, grievous faults on both sides . 
and as there are a set of men, who, not content Avith 
retaliating upon Protestants, deny the persecuting spi- 
rit of the Catholics, I would ask them what they 
think of the following code, drawn up by the French 
Catholics against the French Protestants and carried 
into execution for one hundred years, and as late as 
the year 1765, and not repealed till 1782? 

'Any Protestant clergyman remaining in France 
three days, without coming to the Catholic worship, 
to be punished with death. If a Protestant sends his 
son to a Protestant school-master for education, he is 
to forfeit 250 livres a month, and the schoolmaster 
who receives him, 50 livres. If they sent their chil- 
dren to any seminary abroad, they were to forfeit 
2000 livres, and the child so sent, became incapable of 
possessing property in France. To celebrate Protes- 
'tant worship, exposed the clergyman to a fine of 2800 
livres. The fine to a Protestant for hearing it, was 
1300 livres. If any Protestant denied the authority 
of the pope in France, his goods were seized for- the 
first offence, and he was hanged for the second. If 
any Common Prayer-book, or book of Protestant wor- 
ship be found in the possession of any Protestant, he 
shall forfeit 20 livres for the first offence, 40 livres foT 
the second, and shall be imprisoned at pleasure fox 
the third. Any person bringing from beyond sea, oi 
selling Protestant books of worship, to forfeit 100 li- 
vres. Any magistrate may search Protestant houses 
for such articles. Any person, required by a magis- 
trate to take an oath against the Protestant religion, 
and refusing, to be committed to prison, and if he af 
terwards refuse again, to suffer forfeiture of goods 
Any person, sending any money over sea to the sup- 
port of a Protestant seminary, to forfeit his goods, 
and be imprisoned at the king's pleasure. Any per- 
son going over sea, for Protestant education, to for- 
feit goods and lands for life. The vessel to be forfeit- 
ed which conveyed any Protestant woman or child 
over sea, without the king's license. Any person con 
verting another to the Protestant religion, to be put 
to death. Death to any Protestant priest to come in- 
to France ; death to the person who receives him 
forfeiture of goods and imprisonment to send money 
for the relief of any Protestant clergyman : large re 
wards for discovering a Protestant parson. Every 
Protestant shall cause his child, within one month af- 
ter birth, to be baptized by a Catholic priest, under a 
penalty of 2000 livres. Protestants were fined 4000 
livres a month for being absent from Catholic wor- 
ship, were disabled from holding offices and employ- 
ments, from keeping arms in their houses, from main- 
taining suits at law, from being guardians, from prac- 
tising in law or physic, and from holding offices, civil 
or military. They were forbidden (bravo, Louis 
XIV. .') to travel more than five miles from home 
without license, under pain of forfeiting all their 
goods, and they might not come to court under pain 



CATHOLIC QUESTION, 



307 



of 2000 livres. A married Protestant woman when 
convicted of being of that persuasion was liable to for- 
feit two-thirds of her jointure ; she could not be exe- 
cutrix to her husband, nor have any part of his goods ; 
and during her marriage, she might be kept in prison, 
unless her husband redeemed her at the rate of 200 
livres a month, or the third part of his lands. Protes- 
tants convicted of being such, were, within three 
months after their conviction, either to submit, and 
renounce their religion, or, if required by four magis- 
' trates, to abjure the realm, and if they did not depart, 
or departing returned, were to suffer death. All Pro- 
testants were required, under the most tremendous 
penalties, to swear that they considered the pope as 
the head of the church. If they refused to take this 
oath, which might be tendered at pleasure by any two 
magistrates, they could not act as advocates, proeu- 
reurs, or notaries public. Any Protestant taking any 
office, civil or military, was compelled to abjure the 
Protestant religion ; to declare his belief in the doc- 
trine of transubstantiation, and to take the Roman 
Catholic sacrament within six months, under the pen- 
alty of 10,000 livres. Any person professing the Pro- 
testant religion, and educated in the same, was requir- 
ed, in six months after the age of sixteen, to declare 
the pope to be the head of the church ; to declare his 
belief in transubstantiation, and that the invocation of 
saints was according to the doctrine of the Christian 
religion ; failing this, he could not hold, possess, or 
inherit landed propert) r ; his lands were given to the 
nearest Catholic relation. Many taxes were doubled 
upon Protestants. Protestants keeping schools were 
imprisoned for life, and all Protestants were forbidden 
to come within ten miles of Paris or Versailles. If 
any Prot estant had a horse worth more than 100 livres, 
any Catholic magistrate might take it away, and 
search the house of the said Protestant for arms.' Is 
not this a monstrous code of persecution ? Is it any 
wonder, after reading such a spirit of tyranny as here 
exhibited, that the tendencies of the Catholic religion 
should be suspected, and that the cry of no Popery 
should be a rallying sign to every Protestant nation 
in Europe? .... Forgive, gentle reader, and 
gentle elector, the trifling deception I have practised 
upon you. This code is not a code made by French 
Catholics against French Protestants, but by English 
and Irish Protestants against English and Irish Ca- 
tholics ; I have given it to you for the most part, as it 
is set forth in Bums' 'Justice' of 17S0: it was acted 
upon in the beginning of the late king's reign, and 
was notorious through the whole of Europe, as the 
most cruel and atrocious system of persecution ever 
instituted by one religious' sect against another. Of 
this code, Mr. Burke says, that < it is a truly barbar- 
ous system; where all the parts are an outrage on the 
laws of humanity and the rights of nature ; it is a 
system of elaborate contrivance, as well fitted for the 
oppression, imprisonment, and degradation of a peo- 
ple, and the debasement of human nature itself, as 
ever proceeded from the perverted ingenuity of man.' 
It is in vain to say that these cruelties were laws of 
political safety ; such has always been the plea for all 
religious cruelties ; by such arguments the Catholics 
defended the massacre of St. Bartholomew, and the 
burnings of Mary. 

With such facts as these, the cry of persecution will 
not do ; it is unwise to make it, because it can be so 
very easily, and so very justly retorted. The business 
is, to forget and forgive, to kiss and be friends, and to 
say nothing of what has past, which is to the credit 
of neither party. There have been atrocious cruelties, 
and abominable acts of injustice on both sides. It is 
not worth while to contend who shed the most blood, 
or whether (as Dr. Sturgess objects to Dr. Milner,) 
death by fire is worse than hanging or starving in pri- 
son. As far as England itself is concerned, the bal- 
ance may be better preserved. Cruelties exercised 
upon the Irish go for nothing in English reasoning • 
but if it were not uncandid and vexatious to consider 
Irish persecutions* as part of the case, I firmly be. 

•• Thurloe writes o Henry Cromwell to catch up some 
thousand Irish boys, to send to the colonies. Henry writes 



lieve there have been two Catholics put to death foi 
religious causes in Great Britain for one Protestant 
who has suffered ; not that this proves much, because 
the Catholics have enjoyed the sovereign power for so 
few years between this period and the Reformation, 
and certainly it must be allowed that they were not 
inactive, during that period, in the great work of pious 
combustion. 

It is however, some extenuation of the Catholic ex- 
cesses, that their religion was the religion of the whole 
of Europe, when the innovation began. They were 
the ancient lords and masters of faith, before men in- 
troduced the practice of thinking for themselves in 
these matters. The Protestants have less excuse, 
who claimed the right of innovation, and then turned 
round upon other Protestants who acted upon the 
same principle, or upon Catholics who remained as 
they were, and visited them with all the cruelties 
from which they had themselves so recently escaped. 
Both sides, as they acquired power, abused it ; and 
both learnt from their sufferings, the great secret of 
toleration and forbearance. If you wish to do good in 
the times in which you live, contribute your efforts to 
perfect this grand work. I have not the most distant 
intention to interfere in local politics, but I advise you 
never to give a vote to any man, whose only title for 
asking it is, that he means to continue the punish- 
ments, privations, and incapacities of any human be- 
ings, merely because they worship God in the way 
they think best : the man who asks for your vote upon 
such a plea, is, probably, a very weak man, who be- 
lieves in his own bad reasoning, or a very artful man, 
who is laughing at you for your credulity : at all 
events, he is a man who, knowingly or unknowingly, 
exposes his country to the greatest dangers, and hands 
down to posterity all the foolish opinions and all the 
bad passions which prevail in those times in which he 
happens to live. Such a man is so far from being that 
friend to the church which he pretends to be, that he 
declares its safety cannot be reconciled with the fran- 
chises of the people ; for what worse can be said of 
the Church of England than this, that wherever it is 
judged necessary to give it a legal establishment, it 
becomes necessary to deprive the body of the people, 
if they adhere to their old opinions, of their liberties, 
and of all their free customs, and to reduce them to a 
state of civil servitude? 

SIDNEY SMITH. 



A SERMON 
On those Rules of Christian Charity by which our Opin- 
ions of other Sects should be formed : Preached before 
the Mayor and Corporation, in the Cathedral Church 
of Bristol, On Wednesday, November 5, 1S28. 

I publish this sermon (or rather allow others to 
publish it), because many persons, who know the city 
of Bristol better than I do, have earnestly solicited me 
to do so ; and are convinced it will do good. It is not • 
without reluctance (as far as I myself am concerned) 
that I sent to the press such plain rudiments of com- 
mon charity and common sense. 

SYDNEY SMITH. 

Nov. 8, 1828. 

Col. ni. 12, 13. 

' PUT ON, AS THE ELECT OF GOD, KINDNESS, HUMBLENESS OP 
MIND, MEEKNESS, LONG-SUFFERING, FOKBEABING ONE AN- 
OTHER, AND FORGIVING ONE ANOTHER.' 

The Church of England, in its wisdom and piety, 
has very properly ordained that a day of thanksgiving 
should be set apart, in which we may return thanks to 
Almighty God for the mercies vouchsafed to this na- 



back he has done so ; and desires to know whether his 
highness would choose as many girls to be caught up : and 
he°adds, < doubtless it is a business, in which God will ap- 
pear. Suppose bloody queen Mary had caught up and trans- 
ported three or four thousand Protestant boys and girls 
from the three ridings of Yorkshire !!!!!! 



308 



WORKS OF THE REV. SIDNEY SMITH. 



tion in their escape from the dreadful plot planned for 
the destruction of the sovereign and his Parliament, — 
the forerunner, no doubt, of such sanguinary scenes as 
"were suited to the manners of that age, and must have 
proved the inevitable consequence of such enormous 
wickedness and cruelty. Such an escape is a fair and 
lawful foundation for national piety. And it is a come- 
ly and Christian sight to see the magistrates and high 
authorities of the land obedient to the ordinances of 
the church, and holding forth to their fellow-subjects a 
wise example of national gratitude and serious devo- 
tion. This use of this day is deserving of every com- 
mendation. The idea that Almighty God does some- 
times exercise a special providence for the preserva- 
tion of a whole people is justified by Scripture, is not 
repugnant to reason, and can produce nothing but 
feelings and opinions favourable to virtue and religion. 

Another wise and lawful use of this day is an honest 
self-congratulation that we have burst through those 
bands which the Roman Catholic priesthood would 
impose upon human judgment; that the Protestant 
Church not only permits, but exhorts, every man to 
appeal from human authority to the Scriptures; that 
it makes of the clergy guides and advisers, not masters 
and oracles ; that it discourages vain and idle ceremo- 
nies, unmeaning observances, and hypocritical pomp ; 
and encourages freedom in thinking upon religion, and 
simplicity in religious forms. It is impossible that any 
candid man should not observe the marked superiority 
of the Protestant over the Catholic faith in these par- 
ticulars ; and difficult that any pious man should not 
feel grateful to Almighty Providence for escape from 
danger which woidd have plunged this country afresh 
into so many errors and so many absurdities. 

I hope, iuthis condemnation of the Catholic religion 
(in which I most sincerely join its bitterest enemies), 
I shall not be so far mistaken as to have it suj^posed 
that I would convey the slightest approbation of any 
laws which disqualify or incapacitate any class of men 
from civil offices on account of religious opinions. I 
regard all such laws as fatal and lamentable mistakes 
in legislation ; they are mistakes of troubled times, and 
half-barbarous ages. All Europe is gradually emerg- 
ing from their influence. This country has lately, 
with the entire consent of its prelates, made a noble 
and successful effort, by the abolition of some of the 
most obnoxious laws of this class. In proportion as 
such example is followed, the enemies of church and 
state will be diminished, and the foundation of peace, 
order, and happiness be strengthened. These are my 
opinions, which I mention, not to convert you, but to 
guard myself from misrepresentation. It is my duty, 
— it is my wish, — it is the subject of this day to point 
out those evils of the Catholic religion from which we 
have escaped ; but I should be to the last degree con- 
cerned, if a condemnation of theological errors were to 
be construed into an approbation of laws which I can- 
not but consider as deeply marked by a spirit of intol- 
erance. Therefore, I beg you to remember that I re- 
cord these opinions not for the purpose of converting 
any one to them, which would be an abuse of the priv- 
ilege of addressing you from the pulpit ; not that I at- 
tach the slightest degree of importance to them 
because they are mine ; but merely to guard myself 
from misrepresentation upon a point on which all 
men's passions are, at this moment, so powerfully ex- 
cited. 

I have said that, at this moment, all men's passions 
are powerfully excited on this subject. If this is true, 
it points out to me my line of duty. I must use my 
endeavours to guard against the abuse of the day ; to 
take care that the principles of sound reason are not 
lost sight of; and that such excitement, instead of ris- 
ing into dangerous vehemence, is calmed into active 
and useful investigation of the subject. 

I shall, therefore, on the present occasion, not inves- 
tigate generally the duties of charity and forbear- 
ance, but of charity and forbearance in religious mat- 
ters ; of that Christian meekness and humility which 
prevent the intrusion of bad passions into religious 
concerns, and keep calm and pure the mind intent 
upon eternity. And remember, I beg of you, that the 
rules I shall offer you for the observation of Christian 



charity are general, and of universal application. 
What you choose to do, and which way you incline 
upon any particular question, are, and can be, no 
concern of mine. It would be the height of arrogance 
and presumption in me, or in any other minister of 
God's Word, to interfere on such points ; I only en- 
deavour to teach that spirit of forbearance and chari- 
ty, which (though it cannot always prevent differen- 
ces upon religious points) will ensure that these dif- 
ferences are carried on with Christian gentleness. I 
have endeavoured to lay down these rules for differ- 
ence with care and moderation ; and, if you will at- 
tend to them patiently, I think you will agree with me, 
that, however the practice of them maybe forgotten, 
the propriety of them cannot be denied. 

It would always be easier to fall in with human pas- 
sions than to resist them ; but the ministers of God 
must do their duty through evil report, and through 
good report ; neither prevented nor excited by the in- 
terests of the present day. They must teach those 
general truths which the Christian religion has com- 
mitted to their care, and upon which the happiness 
and peace of the world depend. 

In pressing upon you the great duty of religious 
charity, the inutility of the opposite defect of religious 
violence first offers itself to, and, indeed, obtrudes it- 
self upon my notice. The evil of difference of opinion 
must exist ; it admits of no cure. The wildest vision- 
ary does not now hope he can bring his fellow-crea- 
tures to one standard of faith. If history has taught 
us any one thing, it is that mankind, on such sort of 
subjects, will form their own opinions. Therefore, to 
want charity in religious matters is at least useless ; 
it hardens error and provokes recrimination ; but it 
does not enlighten those whom we wish to reclaim 
nor does it extend doctrines which to us appear so 
clear and indisputable. But to do wrong, and to gain 
nothing by it, are surely to add folly to fault, and to 
proclaim an understanding not led by the rule of rea- 
son, as well as a disposition unregulated by the Chris- 
tian faith. 

Religious charity requires that we should not judge 
any sect of Christians by the representations of their 
enemies alone, without hearing and reading what they 
have to say in their own defence ; it requires only, of 
course, to state such a rule to procure for it general 
admission. No man can pretend to say that such a 
rule is not founded upon the plainest principles of jus- 
tice — upon those plain principles of justice which no 
one thinks of violating in the ordinary concerns of 
life ; and yet I fear that rule is not always very strict- 
ly adhered to in religious animosities. Religious ha- 
tred is often founded on tradition, often on hearsay, 
often on the misrepresentations of notorious enemies ; 
without inquiry, without the slightest examination of 
opposite reasons and authorities, or consideration of 
that which the accused party has to offer for defence or 
explanation. It is impossible, I admit, to examine 
every thing ; many have not talents, many have not 
leisure, for such pursuits ; many must be contented 
with the faith in which they have been brought up, 
and must think it the best modification of the Chris- 
tian faith, because they are told it is so. But this im- 
perfect acquaintance with religious controversy, 
though not blameable when it proceeds from want of 
power, and want of opportunity, can be no possible jus- 
tification of violent and acrimonious opinions. I would 
say to the ignorant man, ' It is not your ignorance I 
blame ; you have had no means, perhaps, of acquiring 
knowledge : the circumstances of your life have not 
led to it — may have prevented it ; but then I must tel) 
you, if you have not had leisure to inquire, you have 
no right to accuse. If you are unacquainted with the 
opposite arguments, — or, knowing, can balance them, 
it is not upon you the task devolves of exposing the 
errors, and impugning the opinions of other sects.' If 
charity is ever necessary, it is in those who know ac- 
curately neither the accusation nor the, defence. If 
invective, — if rooted antipathy, in religious opinions, is 
ever a breach of Christian rules, it is so in those who, 
not being able to become wise, are not willing to be- 
come charitable and modest. 

Any candid man, acquainted with religious contro- 



A SERMON ON CHRISTIAN CHARITY. 



309 



versy, will, I think, admit that he has frequently, hi 
the course of his studies, been astonished by the force 
of arguments with which that cause has been defended, 
which he at first thought incapable of any defence at 
all. Some accusations he has found to be utterly 
groundless ; in others the facts and arguments have 
been mis-stated; in other instances the accusation has 
been retorted ; in many cases the tenets have been 
deiended by strong arguments and honest appeal to 
Scripture ; in many with consummate acuteness and 
deep learning. So that religious studies often teach to 
opponents a greater respect for each other's talents, 
motives, and acquirements ; exhibit the real difficulties 
of the subject; lessen the surprise and anger which 
are apt to be excited by opposition ; and, by these 
means, promote that forgiving one another, and for- 
bearing one another which are so powerfully recom- 
mended by the words of my text. 

A great deal of mischief is done by not attending to 
the limits of interference with each" other's religious 
opinions, — by not leaving to the power and wisdom of 
God that which belongs to God alone. Our holy reli- 
gion consists of some doctrines which influence prac- 
tice, and others which are purely speculative. If reli- 
gious errors are of the former description, they may, 
perhaps, be fair objects of human interference ; but if 
the opinion is merely theological and speculative, 
there the right of human interference seems to end, 
because the necessity for such interference does not 
exist. Any error of this nature is between the Creator 
and the creature, — between the Redeemer and the re- 
deemed. If such opinions are not the best opinions 
which can be found, God Almighty will punish the 
error, if error seemeth to the Almighty a fit object of 
punishment. Why may not man Avait if God waits? 
Where are we called upon in Scripture to pursue men 
for errors purely speculative ? — to assist Heaven in 
punishing those offences, which belong only to Hea- 
ven ? — in fighting unasked for what we deem to be the 
battles of God, — of that patient and merciful God, who 
pities the frailties we do not pity — who forgives the 
errors we do not forgive, — who sends rain upon the 
just and the unjust, and maketh his sun to shine upon 
the evil and the good ? , 

Another canon of religious charity is to revise, at 
long intervals, the bad opinions we have been compel- 
led, or rather our forefathers have been compelled, to 
form of other Christian sects; to see whether the dif- 
ferent bias of the age, the more general. diffusion of 
intelligence, do not render these tenets less pernicious : 
that which might prove a very great evil under other 
circumstances, may, perhaps, however weak and erro- 
neous, be harmless in these times, and under these 
circumstances. We must be aware, too. that we do 
not mistake recollections for apprehensions, and con- 
found together what is past with what is to come, — 
history with futurity. For instance, it would be the 
most enormous abuse of this religious institution to 
imagine that such dreadful scenes of wickedness are 
to be apprehended from the Catholics of the present 
day, because the annals of this country were disgraced 
by such an event two hundred years ago. It would be 
an enormous abuse of this day to extend the crimes of 
a few desperate wretches to a whole sect ; to fix the 
passions of dark ages upon times of refinement and 
civilization. All these are mistakes and abuses of 
this day, which violate every principle of Christian 
charity, endanger the peace of society, and give life 
and perpetuity to hatreds, which must perish at one 
time or another, and had better, for the peace of socie- 
ty, perish now. 

it would be religiously charitable, also, to consider 
whethet the objectionable tenets, which different sects 
profess, are in their hearts as well as in their books. 
There is, unfortunaUly, so much pride where there 
ought to be so much humility, that it is difficult, if not 
almost impossible, to make religious sects abjure or 
recant the doctrines they have once professed. It is 
not in this manner, I fear, that the best and purest 
churches are ever reformed. But the doctrine gradu- 
ally becomes obsolete ; and, though not disoAvned, 
ceases in fact to be a distinguishing characteristic of 
the se< t which professes it. These modes of reforma- 



tion,^ — this silent antiquation of doctrines, — this real 
improvement, Avhich the parties themselves are too 
Avise not to feel, though not wise enough to OAvn, must, 
I am afraid, be generally conceded to human infirmity. 
They are indulgences not unnecessary to many sects of 
Christians. The more generous method would be to ad- 
mit error, where error exists, to say these Avere the te- 
nets and interpretations of dark and ignorant ages ; wi- 
der inquiry, fresh discussion, superior intelligence have 
convinced us Ave are wrong ; Ave will act in future upon 
better and Aviser principles. This is what men do in 
laws, arts, and sciences ; and happy for them would it 
be if they used the same modest docility in the highest 
of all concerns. But it is, I fear, more than experience 
will allow us to expect ; and therefore the kindest and 
most charitable method is to allow religious sects si- 
lently to improve without reminding them of, and 
taunting them with, the improvement ; Avithout bring- 
ing them to the humiliation of former disavoAval, or 
the still more pernicious practice of defending what 
they knoAV to be indefensible. The triumphs which 
proceed from the neglect of these principles are not 
(what they pretend to be) the triumphs of religion, but 
the triumphs of personal vanity. The object is not to 
extinguish dangerous errors with as little pain and de- 
gradation as possible to him who has fallen into the 
error, but the object is to exalt ourselves, and to de- 
preciate our theological opponents, as much as possi- 
ble, at any expense to Gocl's service, and to the real 
interests of truth and religion. 

There is another practice not less common than 
this, and equally uncharitable ; and that is to repre- 
sent the opinions of the most violent and eager per- 
sons avIio can be met Avith, as the common and re- 
ceived opinions of the whole sect. There are, in every 
denomination of Christians, individuals, by whose 
opinion or by whose conduct the great body would 
very reluctantly be judged. Some men aim at attract- 
ing notice by singularity ; some are deficient in tem- 
per ; some in learning ; some push every principle to 
the extreme ; distort, overstate, pervert ; fill every 
one to whom their cause is dear with concern that it 
should have been committed to such rash and intem- 
perate advocates. If you wish to gain a victory over 
your antagonists, these are the men Avhose Avritings 
you should study, Avhose opinions you should dwell on, 
and should carefully bring fonvard to notice ; but if 
you wish, as the elect of God, to put on kindness and 
humbleness, meekness and long-suffering, — if you 
wish to forbear and to forgive, it will then occur to 
you that you should seek the true opinions of any sect 
from those only who are approved of, and reverenced 
by that sect ; to whose authority that sect defer, and 
by Avhose arguments they consider their tenets to be 
properly defended. This may not suit your purpose 
if you are combating for victory; but it is your duty 
if you are combating for truth ; it is the safe, honest, 
and splendid conduct of him Avho never writes nor 
speaks on religious subjects, but that he may diffuse 
the real blessings of religion among his fellow-crea- 
tures, and restrain the bitterness of controversy by 
the feelings of Christian charity and forbearance. 

Let us also ask ourselves, when we are sitting in 
seA'ere judgment upon the faults, follies and errors of 
other Christian sects, whether it is not barely possi- 
ble that Ave have fallen into some mistakes and mis- 
representations ? Let us ask ourselves, honestly and 
fairly, Avhethcr Ave are A\-holly exempt from prejudice, 
from pride, from obstinate adhesion to what candour 
calls upon us to alter, and to yield ? Are there no vio- 
lent and mistaken members of our oavu community, 
by Avhose conduct we should be loath to be guided, — by 
Avhose tenets we should not choose our faith to be 
judged? Has time, that improves all, found nothing 
in us to change for the better ? Amid all the manifold 
divisions of the Christian world, are Ave the only 
Christians who, AA'ithout having any thing to learn 
from the knowledge and civilization of the last three 
centuries, have started up, Avithout infancy, and with- 
out error, into consummate AA r isdom and spotless per- 
fection ? 

To \isten to enemies as weil as friends is a rule 
which 'not only increases sense in common life, but is 



310 



WORKS OF THE REV. SIDNEY SMITH. 



highly favourable to the increase of religious candour. I religious disputes which appear to be coming on in the 
You hnd that you are not so free from faults as your world. If you choose to perpetuate the restrictions 
friends suppose, nor so full of faults as your enemies ' upon your fellow-creatures, no one has a right to call 
suppose. You begin to think it not impossible that you bigoted; if you choose to do them away, no one 
you may be . as unjust to others as they are to you ; has any right to call you lax and indifferent ; you have 
and that the wisesi and most Christian scheme is that j done your utmost to do right, and whether you err, or 
of mutual indulgence ; that it is better to put on, as | do not err, in your mode of interpreting the Christian 
the elect of God, kindness, humbleness of mind, religion, you show at least that you have caught its 
meekness, long-suffering, forbearing one another, and ■ heavenly spirit — that you have put on, as the elect of 
forgiving one another. ' I God, kindness, humbleness of mind, meekness, long- 

Some men cannot understand how they are to be j suffering, forbearing one another, and forgiving one 
zealous if they are candid in religious matters ; how | another. 

the energy necessary for the one virtue is compatible j I have thus endeavoured to lay before you the uses 
with the calmness which the other requires. But re- j and abuses of this day; and, having stated the great 
member that the Scriptures carefully distinguish be- mercy of God's interference, and the blessings this 
twe en laudable' zeal and indiscreet zeal; that the j country has secured to itself in resisting the errors and 
a.posties and epistolary writers knew they had as | follies, and superstitions of the Catholic Church, I 
much to fear from the over-excitement of some men as j have endeavoured that this just sense of our own supe- 



trom the supineness of others ; and in nothing have 
they laboured more than in preventhig religion from 
arming human passions instead of allaying them, and 
rendering those principles a source of mutual jealousy 
and hatred which were intended for universal peace. 
I admit that indifference sometimes puts on tne ap- 
pearance of candour; but though there is a counter- 
feit, yet there is a reality ; and the imitation proves 
the value of the original, because men only attempt to 
multiply the appearances of useful and important 
things. The object is to be at the same time pious to 
God and charitable to man ; to render your own faith 
as pure and perfect as possible, not only without hatred 
o: these who differ from you, but with a constant 
recollection that it is possible, in spite of thought and 
study, that you may have been mistaken — that other 
sects may be right, and that a zeal in his service, 
which God does not want, is a very bad excuse for 
those bad passions which his sacred word condemns. 
Lastly, I would suggest that many differences be 
tween sects are of less importance 'than the furious 
zeal of many men would make them. Are the tenets 
of any sect of sucn a description, that we believe they 
will be saved under the Christian faith ? Do they fulfil 
the common duties of life l . Do they respect property ? 
Are they obedieut to the laws? Do they speak the 
truth? If all these things are right, the violence of 
hostility may surely submit to some little softness and 
relaxation; honest difference of' opinion cannot call 
for such entire separation and complete antipathy ; 
such zeal as this, if it be zeal, and not something 
worse, is not surely zeal according to discretion. 

The arguments, theu, which I have adduced in 
support of the great principles of religious charity are, 
that violence upon such subjects is rarely or ever 
found to be useful ; but generally to produce effects 
opposite to those which are intended. I have ob- 
served that religious sects are not to be judged from 
the representations of their enemies ; but that they 
are to be heard for themselves, in the pleadings of 
their best writers, not in the representations of those 
whose intemperate zeal is a misfortune to the sect to 
which they belong. If you will study the principles. 
of your religious opponents, you will often find your 
contempt and hatred lessened in proportion as you are 
better acquainted with what you despise. Manj r reli- 
gious opinions, which are purely speculative, are 
without the limits of human interference. In the 
numerous sects of Christianity, interpreting our religion 
in different manner?, ail cannot be right. Imitate the 
forbearance of God, who throws the mantle of his 
mercy over all, and who will probably save, on the 
last day. the piously right and the piously wrong, 
seeking Jesus in humbleness of mind. Do not drive 
religious sects to the disgrace (or to what they 
foolishly think the disgrace) of formally disavowing 
tenets they once possesed, but concede something to 
human weakness; and, when the tenet is virtually 
given up, treat it as if it were actually given up ; 
and always consider it to be very possible that 
yourself may have made mistakes, and fallen into 
erroneous opinions, as well as any other sect to 
which you are opposed. If you put on these dispo- 
sitions and this tenour of mind, you cannot be guilty 
of any religious fault, take what'part you will in the 



riority should not militate against the sacred principles 
of Christian charity. That charity which I ask for 
others, I ask also for myself. I am sure I am preach- 
ing before those who will think (whether they agree 
with me or not) that I have spoken conscientiously, 
and from good motives, and from honest feelings, on 
a very different subject— not sought for by me, but 
devolving upon me in the course of duty ; — in which I 
should have been heartily ashamed of myself (as you 
would have been ashamed of me), if I had thought 
only how to flatter and please, or thought of any thing 
but What I hone always to think of in the pulpit— that 
I am placed here by God to tell the truth, and to do 
good. 

I shall conclude my sermon, (pushed, I am afraid, 
already to an unreasonable length,) by reciting to you 
a very short and beautiful apologue, taken from the 
rabbinical writers. It is, I believe, quoted by Bishop 
Taylor, in his « Holy Living aad Dying.' I have not 
now access to that book, but quote it to you from me- 
mory ; and should be made truly happy if you would 
quote it to others from memory also. 

1 As Abraham was sitting in the door of his tent, 
there came unto him a wayfaring man ; and Abraham 
gave him water for his feet, and set bread before him. 
And Abraham said unto him, "Let us now worship 
the Lord our God before we eat of this bread." And 
the wayfaring man said unto Abraham, " I will not 
worship the Lord thy God, for thy God is not my 
God, but I will worship my God, even the God of my 
fathers." But Abraham was exceeding wroth; and he 
rose up to put the wayfaring man forth from the door 
of his tent. And the voice of the Lord was heard in 
the tent,— Abraham, Abraham! have I not borne 
with this man for three score and ten years, and canst 
thou not bear with him for one hour V 



LETTERS, 

On the subject of the Catholics, to my Brother Abraham, 

who lives in the country, 

BY PETER PLYMLEY. 

LETTER I. 

Dear Abraham — 

A worthier and better man than yourself does ndt 
exist ; but I have always told you, from the time of 
our boyhood, that you were a bit of a goose. Your 
parochial affairs are governed with exemplary order 
and regularity ; your are as powerful in the vestry as 
Mr. Percival is 'in the House of Commons,— and, I 
must say, with much more reason ; nor do I know any 
church where the faces and smock-frocks of the con- 
gregation are so clean, or their eyes so uniformly di- 
rected to the preacher. There is another point upon 
which I will do you ample justice, and that is, that 
the eyes so directed towards you are wide open ; for 
the rustic has, in general, good principles, though he 
cannot control his animal habits ; and, however loud 
he may snore, his face is perpetually turned towards 
the fountain of orthodoxy. 

Having done this act of justice, I shall proceed, 
according to our ancient intimacy and familiarity, to 



PETER PLYMLEY'S LETTERS. 



Sll 



expiain to you my opinions about the Catholics, and to 
reply to yours 

In the first place, my sweet Abraham, the pope is 
not landed — nor are there any curates sent out after 
him — nor has he been hid at St. Alban's, by the Dowa- 
ger Lady Spencer — nor dined privately at Holland 
House — nor been seen near Dropmore. If these fears 
exist, (which I do not believe,) they exist only in the 
mind of the chancellor oi the exchequer ; they emanate 
from his zeal for Protestant interests ; and though 
they reflect the highest honour upon the delicate irri- 
tability of his faith, must certainly be considered as 
more ambiguous proofs of the sanity and vigour of his 
understanding. By this time, however, the best in- 
formed clergy in the neighbourhood of the metropolis 
are convinced that the rumour is without foundation ; 
and, though the pope is probably hovering about our 
coast in a fishing-smack, it is most likely he will fall 
a prey to the vigilance of our cruisers ; and it is cer- 
tain he has not yet polluted the Protestantism of our 
soil. 

Exactly in the same manner, the story of the wood- 
en gods seized at Charing Cross, by an order from the 
Foreign Office, turns out to be without the shadow of 
a foundation : instead of the angels and archangels, 
mentioned by the informer, nothing was discovered 
but a wooden image of Lord Mulgrave, going down to 
Chatham, as a head-piece for the Spanker gun-vessel ; 
it was an exact resemblance of his lordship in his 
military uniform ; and therefore as little like a god as 
can well be imagined. 

Having set your fears at rest as to the extent of the 
conspiracy formed against the Protestant religion, I 
will now come to the argument itself. 

You say these men interpret the Scriptures in an 
unorthodox manner ; and that they eat their God. — 
Very likely. All this may seem very important to 
you, who live fourteen miles from a market town, and, 
from long residence among your living, are become a 
kind of holy vegetable ; and, in a theological sense, it 
is highly important. But I want soldiers and sailors 
for the state ; I want to make a greater use than I 
now can do of a poor country full of men ; I want to 
Tender the military service popular among the Irish ; 
to check the power of France ; to make every possible 
exertion for the safety of Europe, which, hi twenty 
years' time will be nothing but a mass of French 
slaves: and then you, and ten thousand other such 
boobies as you, call out, l For God's sake, do not think 
of raising cavalry and infantry in Ireland ! . . . . 
They interpret the Epistle to Timothy in a different 
manner from what we do ! . . . They eat a bit of 
wafer every Sunda)^ which they call their God !' . . . 
I wish to my soul they would eat you, and such rea- 
soners as you are. What ! when Turk, Jew, Heretic, 
Infidel, Catholic, Protestant, are all combined against 
this country; when men of every religious persuasion, 
and no religious persuasion ; when the population of 
half of the globe is up in arms against us ; are we to 
stand examining our generals and armies as a bishop 
examines a candidate for. holy orders? and to suffer 
no one to bleed for England who does not agree with 
you about the 2d of Timothy ? You talk about the 
Catholics ! If you and your brotherhood have been 
able to persuade the country into a continuation of 
this grossest of all absurdities, you have ten times the 
power which the Catholic clergy ever had in their 
best days. Louis XIV., when he revoked the Edict 
of Nantes, never thought of preventing the Protest- 
ants from fighting his battles ; and gained accordingly 
some of his most splendid victories by the talents of 
his Protestant generals. No power in Europe, but 
yourselves, has ever thought, for these hundred years 
past, of asking whether a bayonet is Catholic, or Pres- 
byterian, or Lutheran ; but whether it is sharp and 
well tempered. A bigot delights in. public ridicule ; 
for he begins to think he is a martj^r. I can promise 
you the lull enjoyment of this pleasure, from one ex- 
tremity of Europe to the other. 

I am as much disgusted with the nonsense of the Ro- 
man Catholic religion as you can be ; and no man 
who talks such nonsense shall ever tithe the product 
of the earth nor meddle with the ecclesiastical estab- 



lishment in any shape ; but what have I to do with 
the speculative nonsense of his theology, when the 
object is to elect the mayor of a country town, or to 
appoint a colonel of a marching regiment ? Will a man 
discharge the solemn impertinences of the one office 
with the less zeal, or shrink from the bloody boldness 
of the other with greater timidity, because the block- 
head believes in all the Catholic nonsense of the real 
presence. I am sorry there should be such impious 
folly in the world, but I should be ten times a greater 
fool than he is, if I refused, in consequence of his folly, 
to lead him out against the enemies of the state. Your 
whole argument is wrong ; the state has nothing what- 
ever to do with theological errors which do not violate 
the common rules of morality, and militate against the 
fair power of the ruler : it leaves all these errors to 
you, and to such as you. You have every tenth porker 
in your, parish for refuting them ; and take care that 
you are vigilant and logical in the task. 

I love the church as well as you do ; but you totally 
mistake the nature of an establishment, when you 
contend that it ought to be connected with the mili- 
tary and civil career of every individual in the state. 
It is quite right that there should be one clergyman 
to every parish interpreting the Scriptures after a par- 
ticular manner, ruled by a regular hierarchy, and paid 
with a rich proportion of haycocks and wheatsheafs. 
When I have laid this foundation for a rational reli- 
gion in the state — when I have placed ten thousand 
well-educated men in different parts of the kingdom 
to preach it up, and compelled every body to pay 
them, whether they hear them or not — I have taken 
such measures as I know must always procure an im- 
mense majority in favour of the established church; 
but I can go no farther. I cannot set up a civil inqui- 
sition, and say to one, you shah not be a butcher, be- 
cause you are not orthodox ; and prohibit another from 
brewing, and a third from administering the law, and 
a fourth from defending the country. If common 
justice did not prohibit me from such a conduct, com- 
mon sense would. The advantage to be gained by 
quitting the heresy would make it shameful to aban- 
don it; and men who had once left the church would 
continue in such a state of alienation from a point of 
honour, and transmit that spirit to the latest pos- 
terity. This is just the effect your disqualifying laws 
have produced. They have fed Dr. Rees and Dr. 
Kippis ; crowded the congregation of the old Jewry to 
suffocation ; and enabled every sublapsarian, and sup- 
ralapsarian, and semipelagian clergyman, to build 
himself a neat brick chapel, and live with some distant 
resemblance to the state of a gentleman. 

You say the king's coronation oath will not allow 
him to consent to any relaxation of the Catholic laws 
— Why not relax the Catholic laws as well as the 
laws against Protestant dissenters ? If one is contrary 
to his oath, the other must be so too ; for the spirit of 
the oath is, to defend the church establishment ; which, 
the Quaker and the Presbyterian differ from as much 
or more than the Catholic ; and yet his majesty has 
repealed the Corporation and Test Act in Ireland, and 
done more for the Catholics of both kingdoms than 
had been done for them since the Reformation. In 
177S, the ministers said nothing about the royal con- 
science ; in 1793* no conscience; in 1S04 no con- 
science ; the common feeling of humanity and justice 
then seem to have had their fullest influence upon the 
advisers of the crown ; but in 1807— a year, I suppose, 
eminently fruitful in moral and religious scruples, (as 
some years are fruitful in apples, some in hops,) — it 
is contended by the well paid John Bowles, and by 
Mr. Perceval (who tried to be well paid), that that is 
now perjury which w T e had hitherto called policy and 
benevolence ! Religious liberty has never made such 
a stride as under the reign of his present majesty ; nor 
is there any instance in the annals of our history, 
where so many infamous and damnable laws have 
been repealed as those against the Catholics which 
have been put an end to by him; and then, at the 



* These feelings of humanitv and justice were at some 
periods a little quickened by the representations, of 40,000 
armed volunteers. 



312 



WORKS OF THE REV. SIDNEY SMITH. 



close of this useful policy, his advisers discover that 
the very measures of concession and indulgence, or 
(to use my own language) the measures of justice, 
Which he has been pursuing through the whole of his 
reign, are contrary to the oath he takes at its com- 
mencement ! That oath binds his majesty not to con- 
cent to any measure contrary to the interests of the 
established church ; but who is to judge of the tend- 
ency of each particular measure ? Mot the king alone ; 
it never can be the intention of this law that the king, 
who listens to the advice of his Parliament upon a 
road bill, should reject it upon the most important of 
all measures. Whatever be his own private judgment 
of the tendency of any ecclesiastical bill, he complies 
most strictly with his oath, if he is guided in that par- 
ticular point by the advice of his Parliament, who 
may be presumed to understand its tendency better 
than the king, or any other individual. You say, if 
Parliament had been unanimous in their opinion of the 
absolute necessity for Lord Howick's bill, and the 
king had thought it pernicious, he would have been 
perjured if he had not rejected it. I say, on the con- 
trary, his majesty would have acted in the most con- 
scientious manner, and have complied most scrupu- 
lously with his oath, if he had sacrificed his own opi- 
nion to the opinion of the great council of the nation ; 
because the "probability was that such opinion was 
better than his own ; and upon the same principle, in 
common life, you give up your opinion to your physi- 
cian, your lawyer, and your builder. 

You admit this bill did not compel the king to elect 
Catholic officers, but only gave him the option of doing 
so if he pleased ; but you add, that the king was right 
in not trusting such dangerous power to himself or his 
Successors. Now, you are either to suppose that the 
King, for the time being, has a zeal for the Catholic 
establishment, or that he has not. If he has not, 
where is the danger of giving such an option ? If you 
suppose that he may bo influenced by such an admira- 
tion of the Catholic" religion, why did his present ma- 
jesty, in the year 1804, consent to that bill which em- 
powered the crown to station ten thousand Catholic 
soldiers in any part of the kingdom, and placed them 
absolutely at the disposal of the crown ? If the King 
of England for the time being is a good Protestant, 
there can be no danger in making the Catholic eligible 
to any thing ; if he is not, no power can possibly be 
so dangerous as that conveyed by the bill last quoted; 
to which, in point of peril, Lord Howick's bill is a 
mere joke. But the real fact is, one bill opened a 
door to his majesty's advisers for trick, jobbing, and 
intrigue ; the other did not. 

Besides,what folly to talk to me of an oath, which, 
under all possible circumstances, is to prevent the re- 
laxation of the Catholic laws ! for such, a solemn ap- 
peal to God sets all conditions and contingencies at de- 
b race. Suppose Bonaparte was to retrieve the only 
very great blunder he has made, and were to succeed, 
after repeated trials, in making an impression upon 
Irelaud, do you think we should hear any thing of the 
impediment of a coronation oath? or would the spirit 
of this country tolerate for an hour such ministers, and 
such unheard-of nonsense, if the most distant prospect 
existed of conciliating the Catholics by every species 
eveu of the most abject concession ? And yet, if your 
argument is good for any thing, the coronation oath 
OUghl to reject, at such a moment, every tendency to 
conciliation, and to bind Ireland forever to the crown 
of France. 

I found in your letter the usual remarks about fire, 
fagot, and bloody Mary. Are you aware, my dear 
priest, that, there were as many persons put to death 
for religious opinions under the mild Elizabeth as un- 
der the bloody Mary? The reign of the former was, 
to be sure, ten times as long ; but I only mention the 
fact, merely to show you that something depends up- 
on the age in which men live, as well as on their reli- 
gious opinions. Three hundred years ago, men burnt 
and hanged each other for these opinions. Time has 
softened Catholic as well as Protestant ; they both ro- 
quired it ; though each perceives only his own im- 
provement, and is blind to that of the other. We are 
all the creatures of ciicumstances. I know not a 



kinder and better man than yourself; but you (if you 
had lived in those times) would certainly have roasted 
your Catholic ; and I promise you, if the first exciter 
of this religious mob had been as powerful then as he 
is now, you would soon have been elevated to the mi- 
tre. I do not go the length of saying that the world has 
suffered as much from Protestant as from Catholic 
persecution ; far from it : but you should remember 
the Catholics had all the power, when the idea first 
started up in the world that there could be two modes 
of faith; and that it was much more natural they 
should attempt to crush this diversity of opinion by- 
great and cruel efforts, than that the Protestants 
should rage against those who differed from them, 
when the very basis of their system was complete free- 
dom in all spiritual matters. 

I cannot extend my letter any further at present, but 
you shall soon hear from me again. You tell me I am 
a party man. I hope I shall always be so, when I see 
my country in the hands of a pert London joker and a 
second-rate lawyer. Of the first, no other good is 
known than that he makes pretty Latin verses ; the 
second seems to me to have the head of a country par- 
son, and the tongue of an Old Bailey lawyer. 

If I could see good measures pursued, I care not a 
farthing who is in power ; but I have a passionate 
love for common justice, and for common sense, and I 
abhor and despise every man who builds up his politi- 
cal fortune upon their ruin. 

God bless you, reverend Abraham, and defend you 
from the pope, and all of us from that administration 
who seek power by opposing a measure which Burke, 
Pitt, and Fox all considered as absolutely necessary to 
the existence of the country. 



LETTER II. 

Dear Abraham, 

The Catholic not respect an oath ! why not ? What 
upon earth has kept him out of Parliament, or exclud- 
ed him from ah the offices whence he is excluded, but 
his respect for oaths ? There is no law which prohib- 
its a Catholic to sit in Parliament. There could be no 
such law ; because it is impossible to find out what 
passes in the interior of any man's mind. Suppose it 
were in contemplation to exclude all men from certain 
.offices who contended for the legality of taking tithes : 
the only mode of discovering that fervid love of deci- 
mation'which I know you to possess would be to ten- 
der you an oath ' against that damnable doctrine, that 
it is lawful for a spiritual man to take, abstract, appro- 
priate, subduct, or lead away the tenth calf, sheep, 
lamb, ox, pigeon, duck, &c. &c. &c, and every other 
animal that ever existed, which of course the lawyers 
Avould take care to enumerate. Now this oath I am 
sure you would rather die than take ; and so the Cath- 
olic is excluded from Parliament because he will not 
swear that he disbelieves the leading doctrines of his 
religion ! The Catholic asks you to abolish some oaths 
which oppress him : your answer is, that he does not 
respect oaths. Then why subject him to the test of 
oaths? The oaths keep him out of Parliament ; why 
then he respects them. Turn which way you will, ei- 
ther your laws are nugatory, or the Catholic is bound 
by religious obligations as you are ; but no eel in the 
well-sanded fist of a cook-maid, upon the eve of being 
skinned, ever twisted and writhed as an orthodox par- 
son does when he is compelled by the gripe of reason 
to admit any thing in favour of a dissenter. 

I will not dispute with you whether the pope be or 
be not the Scarlet Lady of Babylon. I hope it is not 
so ; because I am afraid it will induce his majesty's 
chancellor of the exchequer to introduce several se- 
vere bills against Popery, if that is the case ; and 
though he will have the decency to appoint a previous 
committee of inquiry as to the fact, the committee 
will be garbled, and the report inflammatory. Leav- 
ing this to be settled as he pleases to settle it, I wish 
to inform you, that previously to the bill last passed in 
favour of the Catholics, at the suggestion of Mr. Pitt, 
and for his satisfaction, the opinions of six of the most 
celebrated of the foreign Catholic universities were 



PETER PLYMLEY'S LETTERS. 



313 



taken as to the right of the pope to interfere in the 
temporal concerns of any country. The answer can- 
not possibly leave the shadow of a doubt, even in the 
mind of Baron Maseres ; and Dr. Rennel would be 
compelled to admit it, if three bishops lay dead at the 
very moment the question were put to him. To this 
answer might be added also the solemn declaration 
and signature of all the Catholics in Great Britain. 

I should perfectly agree with you, if the Catholics 
admitted such a dangerous dispensing power in the 
hands of the pope ; but they all deny it, and laugh at 
it, and are ready to abjure it in the most decided man- 
ner you can devise. They obey the pope as the spir- 
itual head of their church ; but are you really so fool- 
ish as to be imposed upon by mere names ? — What 
matters it the seven-thousandth, part of a farthing who 
is the spiritual head of any church? Is not Mr. Wil- 
berforce at the head'of the church of Clapham? Is 
not Dr. Letsom at the head ot the Quaker church ? Is 
not the general assembly at the head of the church of 
Scotland ? How, is the government disturbed by these 
many-headed churches ? or in what way is the power 
or the crown augmented by this almost nominal dig- 
nity? 

The king appoints a fast-day once a year, and he 
makes the bishops ; and if the government would take 
half the pains to keep the Catholics out of the arms of 
France that it does to widen Temple Bar, or improve 
Snow Hill, the king would get into his hands the ap- 
pointments of the titular bishops of Ireland. — Both 

Mr. C 's sisters enjoy pensions more than sufficient 

to place the two greatest dignitaries of the Irish Cath- 
olic Church entirely at the disposal of the crown. — 
Every body who knows Ireland knows perfectly well, 
that nothing would be easier, with the expenditure of 
a little money, than to preserve enough of the osten- 
sible appointment in the hands of the pope to satisfy 
the scruples of the Catholics, while the real nomina- 
tion remained with the crown. But, as I have before 
said, the moment the very name of Ireland is men- 
tioned, the English seem to bid adieu to common feel- 
ing, common prudence, and to common sense, and to 
act with the barbarity of tyrants, and the fatuity of 
idiots. 

Whatever your opinion may be of the follies of the 
Roman Catholic religion, remember they are the fol- 
lies of four millions of human beings, increasing rapid- 
ly in numbers, wealth, and intelligence, who, if firmly 
united with this country, would set at defiance the 
power of France, and if once wrested from their alli- 
ance with England, would in three years render its ex- 
istence as an independent nation absolutely impossi- 
ble- You speak of danger to the establishment : I re- 
quest to know when the establishment was ever so 
much in danger as when Hoche was in Bantry Bay, 
and whether all the book* of Bossuet, or the arts of 
the Jesuits were half so terrible ? Mr. Perceval and 
his parsons forgot all this, in their horror lest twelve 
or fourteen old women may be converted to holy wa- 
ter and Catholic nonsense. They never see that, 
while they are saving these venerable ladies from per- 
dition, Ireland may be lost, England broken down, and 
the Protestant Church, with all its deans, prebenda- 
ries, Percevals and Rennels, be swept into the vortex 
of oblivion. . 

Do not, I beseech you, ever mention to me again 
the name of Dr. Duigenan. I have been in every cor- 
ner of Ireland, and have studied its present strength 
and condition with no common labour. Be assured 
Ireland does not contain at this moment less than five 
millions of people. There were returned hi the year 
1791 to the hearth tax 701,000 houses, and there is no 
kind of question that there were about 50,000 houses 
omitted in that return. Taking, however, only the 
number returned for the tax, and" allowing the average 
of six tc h house (a very small average for a potato- 
fed people.) this brings the population to 4,200,000 
people in the year 1791 ; and it can be shown from 
the clearest evidence, (and Mr. Newenham in his 
book shows it,) that Ireland for the last fifty years 
has increased in its population at the rate of 50 or 
60,000 per annum ; which leaves the present popula- 
tion of Ireland at about five million* . after every pos- 



sible deduction for existing circumstances, just and ne- 
cessary wars, monstrous and unnatural rebellions, and 
all other sources of human destruction. Of this popu- 
lation, two out often are Protestants ; and the half o* 
the Protestant population are dissenters, and as inimi- 
cal to the church as the Catholics themselves. In this 
state of things, thumb-screws and whipping — admir- 
able engines of policy, as they must be considered to 
be— will not ultimately avail. The Catholics will hang 
over you ; they will watch for the moment ; and com- 
pel you hereafter to give them ten times as much, 
against your will, as they would now be contented 
with, if it was voluntarily surrendered. Remember 
what happened in the American war ; when Ireland 
compelled you to give her every thing she asked, and 
to renounce, in the most explicit manner, your claim 
of sovereignty over her. God Almighty grant the folly 
of these present men may not bring on such another 
crisis of public affairs ! 

What are your dangers which threaten the estab- 
lishment? — Reduce this declamation to a point, and 
let us understand what you mean. The most ample 
allowance does not calculate that there would be more 
than twenty members who were Roman Catholics in 
one house, and ten in the other, if the Catholic eman- 
cipation were carried into effect. Do you mean that 
these thirty members would bring in a bill to take 
away the tithes from the Protestant, and to pay them 
to the Catholic clergy? Do you mean that a Catholic 
general would march his army into the House of Com- 
mons and purge it of Mr. Perceval and Mr. Duigenan? 
or, that the theological writers would become all of a 
sudden more acute and more learned, if the present 
civil incapacities were removed ? Do you fear for - 
your tithes, or your doctrines, or your person, or the 
English constitution ? Every fear, taken separately, 
is so glaringly absurd, that no man has the folly or 
the boldness to state it. Every one conceals his igno- 
rance, or his baseness, in a stupid general panic, 
which, when called on, he is utterly incapable of ex- 
plaining. Whatever you think of the Catholics, there 
they are — you cannot get rid of them ; your alterna- 
tive is, to give them a lawful place for stating their 
grievances, or an unlawful one : if you do not admit 
them to the House of Commons, they will hold their 
Parliament in Potato-place, Dublin, and be ten times 
as violent and inflammatory as they would be in West- 
minster. Nothing would give me such an idea of 
security, as to see twenty or thirty Catholic gentle- 
men in Parliament, looked upon by all the Catholics 
as the fair and proper organ of theif party. I should 
have thought it the height of good fortune that such a 
wish existed on their part, and the very essence of 
madness and ignorance to reject it. Can you murder 
the Catholics ? — Can you neglect them ? They are to© 
numerous for both these expedients. What remains 
to be done is obvious to every human being — but to 
that man who, instead of being a Methodist preacher, 
is, for the curse of us, and our children, and for the 
ruin of Troy, and the misery of good old Priam and 
his sons, become a legislator and a politician. 

A distinction, I perceive, is taken, by one of the 
most feeble noblemen in Great Britain, between per- 
secution and the deprivation of political power ; where- 
as, there is no more distinction between these two 
things than there is between him who makes the dis- 
tinction and a booby. If I strip off the relic-covered 
jacket of a Catholic, and give him twenty stripes . . . 
I persecute : if I say, every body in the town where 
you live shall be a candidate for lucrative and honour- 
able offices, but you who are a Catholic ... I do not 
persecute ! — What nonsense is this ! as if degradation 
was not as great an evil as bodily pain, or as severe 
poverty ; as if I could not be as great a tyrant by say- 
ing, You shall not enjoy — as by saying, You shall suf- 
fer. The English, I believe, are as truly religious as 
any nation in Europe ; I know no greater blessing , 
but it carries with it this evil in its train, that any vil- 
lain who will bawl out ' The church is in danger !' 
may get a place, and a good pension ; and that any 
administration who will do the same thing may bring 
a set of men into power who, at a moment of station- 
ary and passive piety would be hooted by the very 



314 



WORKS OF THE REV. SIDNEY SMITH. 



boys in the streets. But it is not all religion ; it is, in 
great part, that narrow and exclusive spirit which de- 
lights to keep the common blessings of sun, and air, 
and freedom from other human beings. < Your reli- 
gion has always been degraded ; you are in the dust, 
and I will take care you never rise again! I should 
anjoy less the possession of an earthly good, by every 
additional person to whom it was extended.' You 
may not be aware of it yourself, most reverend Abra- 
ham, but you deny their freedom to the Catholics 
upon the same principle that Sarah your wife refuses 
to give the receipt for a ham or a gooseberry dump- 
ling ; she values her receipts, not because they secure 
to her a certain flavour, but because they remind her 
that her neighbours want it ; — a feeling laughable in 
a priestess, shameful in a priest ; venial when it with- 
holds the blessings of a ham, tyrannical and execrable 
when it narrows the boon of religious freedom. 

•You spend a great deal of ink about the character 
of the present prime-minister. Grant you all that you 
write ; I say, I fear he wDl ruin Ireland, and pursue a 
line of policy destructive to the true interests of his 
country ; and then you tell me, he is faithful to Mrs. 
Perceval, and kind to the Master Percevals ! These 
are, undoubtedly, the first qualifications to be looked 
to in a time of the most serious public danger ; but 
somehow or another (if public and private virtues 
must always be incompatible), I should prefer that 
he destroyed the domestic happiness of Wood or 
Cockell, owed for the veal of the preceding year, 
whipped his boys, and saved his country. 

The late administration did not do right ; they did 
not build their measures upon the solid basis of facts. 
They should have caused several Catholics to have 
been dissected after death by surgeons of every reli- 
gion ; and the report to have been published with ac- 
companying plates. If the viscera, and other organs 
of life, had been found to be the same as in Protestant 
bodies ; if the provision of nerves, arteries, cerebrum, 
and cerebellum, had been the same as we are provi- 
ded with, or as the dissenters are known to possess ; 
then, indeed, they might have met Mr. Perceval upon 
a proud eminence, and convinced the country at large 
of the strong probability that the Catholics are really 
human creatures, endowed with the feelings of men, 
and entitled to all their rights. But instead of this 
wise and prudent measure, Lord HoAvick, with his 
usual precipitation, brings forward a bill in their fa- 
vour, without offering the slightest proof to the coun- 
try that they were any thing more than horses and 
oxen. The person who shows the lama at the corner 
of Piccadilly has the precaution to write up — Allowed 
by Sir Joseph Banks to be a real quadruped : his lord- 
ship might have said — Allowed by the Bench of Bish- 
ops to be real human creatures. ... I could write 
you twenty letters upon this subject ; but I am tired, 
and so I suppose are you. Our friendship is now of 
forty years^ standing ; you know me to be a truly reli- 
gious man ; but I shudder to see religion treated like 
a cockade, or a pint of beer, and made the instrument 
of a party. I love the king, but T love the people as 
well as the king ; and if I am sorry to see his old age 
molested, I am much more sorry to see four millions 
of Catholics baffled in their expectations. If I love 
Lord Grenville, and Lord Howick, it is because they 
Jove their country : if I abhor ****** f it is because I 
know there is but one man among them who is not 
laughing at the enormous folly and credulity of the 
country, and that he is an ignorant and mischievous 
bigot. As for the light and frivolous jester, of whom 
H is your misfortune to think so highly, learn, my dear 
Abraham, that this political Killigrew,just before the 
breaking up of the last administration, was in actual 
treaty with them for a place ; and if they had survived 
twenty-four hours longer, he would have been now de- 
claiming against the cry of No Popery ! instead of in- 
flaming it. — With this practical comment on the base- 
ness of human nature I bid you adieu ! 



LETTER III. 

All that I have so often told you, Mr. Abraham 
plymley, is now coming to pass. The Scythians, in 
whom you and the neighbouring country gentlemeu 
I placed such confidence, are smitten hip and thigh; 
their Benningsen put to' open shame ; their magaziues 
of train oil intercepted, and we are waking from our 
disgraceful drunkenness to all the horrors of Mr. Per- 
ceval and Mr. Canning. . . . We shall now see if 
a nation is to be saved by school-boy jokes and dog- 
gerel rhymes, by affronting petulance, and by the 
tones and gesticulations of Mr. Pitt. But these are 
not all the auxiliaries on which we have to depend ; 
to these his colleague will add the strictest attention 
to the smaller parts of ecclesiastical government, to 
hassocks, to psalters, and to surplices ; in the last 
agonies of England, he will bring in a bill to regulate 
Easter-offerings ; and he will adjust the stipends of 
curates,* when the flag of France is on the hills of 
Kent. Whatever can be done by very mistaken no- 
tions of the piety of a Christian, and by very wretch- 
ed imitation of the eloquence of Mr. Pitt, will be done 
by these two gentlemen. After all, if they both really 
were what they both either wish to be or wish to be 
thought; if the one were an enlightened Christian, 
who drew from the gospel the toleration, the charity, 
and the sweetness which it contains ; and if the other 
really possessed any portion of the great understand- 
ing of his Nisus who guarded him from the weapons 
of the whigs, I should still doubt if they cx>uld save 
us. But I am sure we are not to be saved by religi- 
ous hatred, and by religious trifling ; by any psalmo- 
dy, however sweet • or by any persecution, however 
sharp : I am certain the sounds of Mr. Pitt's voice, 
and the measure of his tones, and the movement oi 
his arms, will do nothing for us; when these tones, 
and movements, and voice bring us always declama- 
tion without sense or knowledge, and ridicule without 
good humour or conciliation. Oh, Mr. Plymley, Mr. 
Plymley, this never will do. Mrs. Abraham Plymley, 
my sister, will be led away captive by an amorous 
Gaul; and Joel Plymley, your first-born will be a 
French drummer. 

Out of sight out of mind, seems to be a proverb 
which applies to enemies as well as friends. Because 
the French army was no longer seen from the cliffs of 
Dover ; because the sound of cannon was no longer 
heard by the debauched London bathers on the Sussex 
coast ; because the Morning Post no longer fixed the 
invasion sometimes for Monday, sometimes for Tues- 
day, sometimes (positively for the last time of inva- 
ding) on Saturday ; because all these causes of terror 
were suspended, you conceived the power of Bonaparte 
to be at an end, and were setting off for Paris, with 
Lord Hawkesbury the conqueror. — This is precisely 
the method in which the English have acted during 
the whole of the revolutionary war. If Austria or 
Prussia armed, doctors of divinity immediately printed 
those passages out of Habakkuk in which the destruc- 
tion of the usurper by General Mac and the Duke of 
Brunswick are so clearly predicted. If Bonaparte 
halted, there was a mutiny, or a dysentery. If any 
one of his generals were eaten up by the light troops 
of Russia, and picked (as their manner is) to the bone, 
the sanguine spirit of this country displayed itself in 
all its glory. What scenes of infamy did the Society 
for the Suppression of Vice lay open to our astonished 
eyes: tradesmen's daughters dancing ; pots of beer 
carried out between the first and second lessson ; the 
dark and distant rumours of indecent prints. Clouds 
of Mr. Canning's cousins arrived by the waggon ; all 
the contractors left their cards with Mr. Rose ; and 
every plunderer of the public crawled out of his hole, ( 
like slugs, and grubs, and worms, after a shower of 
rain. 

If my voice could have been heard at the late chan- 
ges, I should have said, ' Gently; patience; stop a 
little ; the time is not yet come ; the mud of Poland 



* The reverend, the chancellor of the exchequer has, 
since this was written, found time, in the heat of the ses- 
sion, to write a book on the stipends of curates. 



PETER PLYMLEY'S LETTERS. 



315 



will harden, and the bowels of the French grenadiers 
wil] recover their tone. When honesty, good sense, 
and liberality have extricated you out of your present 
embarrassment, then dismiss them as a matter of 
course ; but you cannot spare them just now ; don't be 
in too great a hurry, or there will be no monarch to 
flatter, and no country to pillage ; only submit for a 
little time to be respected abroad ; overlook the pain- 
ful absence of the tax-gatherer for a few years ; bear 
up nobly under the increase of freedom and of liberal 
policy for a little time, and I promise you, at the expi- 
ration of that period, you shall be plundered, insulted, 
disgraced, and restrained to your heart's content. Do 
not imagine I have any intention of putting servility 
and canting hypocrisy permanently out of place, or of 
filling up with courage and sense those offices which 
naturally devolve upon decorous imbecility and inflex- 
ible cunning : give us only a little time to keep off the 
hussars of France, and then the jobbers and jesters 
shall return to their birth-right, and public virtue be 
called by its old name of fanatacism.'* Such is the 
advice I would have offered to my infatuated country- 
men ; but it rained very hard in November, Brother 
Abraham, and the bowels of our enemies were loos- 
ened, and we put our trust in white fluxes, and wet 
mud ; and there is nothing now to oppose to the con- 
quer er of the world but a small table wit, and the sal- 
low surveyor of the meltings. 

You ask me if I think it possible for this country to 
survive the recent misfortunes of Europe ? — T answer 
vou withotl the slightest degree of hesitation, that, if 
Bonaparte lives, and a great deal is not immediately 
dene for the conciliation of the Catholics, it does 
seem to. me absolutely impossible but that we must 
perish ; and take this with you, that we shall perish 
without exciting the slightest feeling of present or 
future compassion, but fall amidst the hootings and 
revilings of Europe, as a nation of blockheads, Metho- 
dists, and old women. If there were any great scene- 
ry, any heroic feelings, any biaze of ancient virtue, 
any exalted death, any termination of England that 
would be ever remembered, ever honoured in that 
western world, where liberty is now retiring, conquest 
would be more tolerable, and ruin more sweet; but it 
is doubly miserable to become slaves abroad, because 
we would be tyrants at home ; to persecute, when we 
are contending against persecution ; and to perish, 
because we have raised up worse enemies within, from 
our own bigotry, than we are exposed to without from 
the unprincipled ambition of France. It is, indeed, a 
most silly and afflicting spectacle to rage at such a 
moment against our own kindred and our oAvn blood ; 
to tell them they cannot be honourable in war because 
they are conscientious in religion ; to stipulate (at the 
very moment when we should buy their hearts and 
swords at any price) that they must hold up the right 
hand in prayer, and not the left ; and adore one com- 
mon God, by turning to the east rather than to the 
west. 

What is it the Catholics ask of you ? Do not ex- 
clude us from the honours and emoluments of the 
state, because we worship God in one way, and you 
worship him in another, — in a period of the deepest 
peace, and the fattest prosperity, this would be a fair 
request ; it should be granted, if Lord Hawkesbury 
had reached Paris, if Mr. Canning's interpreter had 
threatened the Senate in an opening speech, or Mr. 
Perceval explained to them the improvements he 
meant to introduce into the Cathftlic religion ; but to 
deny the Irish this justice now, in the present state of 
Europe, and in the summer months, just as the season 
for destroying -kingdoms is coming on, is, (beloved 
Abraham,) whatever you may think of it, little short 
of positive insanity. 

! * This is Mr. Canning's term for the detection of public 
•abuses ; a term invented by him, and adopted by that sim- 
iJous parasite who is always grinning at his heels. Nature 
descends down to infinite smallness. Mr. Canning has his 
parasites: and if you take a large buzzing blue-bottle fly, 
land look at it in a microscope, you may see 20 or 30 little 
ugly insects crawling about it, which doubtless think their 
I fly to be the bluest, grandest, merriest, most important an- 
il imal in the universe, and are convinced that the world 
i! would be at an end if it ceased to buzz. 



Here is a frigate attacked by a corsair of immense 
strength and size, rigging cut, masts in danger of 
coming by the board, four foot water in the hold, men 
dropping off very fast; in this dreadful situation, how 
do you think the captain acts (whose name shall be 
Perceval) ? He calls all hands upon deck ; talks to 
them of king, country, glory, sweethearts, gin, French 
prison, wooden shoes, old England, and hearts of oak ; 
they give three cheers, rush to their guns, and, after a 
tremendous conflict, succeed in beating off the enemy. 
Not a syllable of all this ; this is not the manner in 
which the honourable commander goes to work ; the 
first thing he does is to secure 20 or 30 of his prime 
sailors, who happen to be Catholics, to clap them in 
irons, and set over them a guard of as many Protes- 
tants ; having taken this admirable method of defend- 
ing himself against his infidel opponents, he goes upon 
deck, reminds the sailors, in a very bitter harangue, 
that they are of different religions ; exhorts the Epis- 
copal gunner not to trust to the Presbyterian quarter- 
master ; issues positive orders that the Catholics 
should be fired at upon the first appearance of discon- 
tent ; rushes through blood and brains, examining his 
men in the catechism and 39 Articles, and positively 
forbids every one to spunge or ram who has not taken 
the sacrament according to the Church of England. 
Was it right to take out a captain made of excellent 
British stuff', and to put in such a man as this? Is not 
he more like a parson, or a talking lawyer, than a tho- 
rough-bred seaman ? And built as she is of heart of 
oak, and admirably manned, is it possible, with such a 
captain, to save this ship from going to the bottom ? 

You have an argument, I perceive, in common with 
many others, against the Catholics, that their demands 
complied with would only lead to farther exactions, 
and that it is better to resist them now, before any- 
thing is conceded, than hereafter, when it is found 
that all concessions are in vain. I wish the chancellor 
of the exchequer, who uses this reasoning to exclude 
others from their just rights, had tried its efficacy, not 
by his understanding, but by (what are full of much 
better things) his pockets." Suppose the person to 
whom he applied for the meltings had withstood every 
plea of wife and fourteen children, no business, and 
good character, and refused him this paltry little office 
because he might hereafter attempt to get hold of the 
revenues of the Duchy of Lancaster for life ; would 
not Mr. Perceval have contended eagerly against the 
injustice of refusing moderate requests, because im- 
moderate ones may hereafter be made ? Would he 
not have said, (and said truly,) leave such exorbitant 
attempts as these to the general indignation of the 
Commons, who will take care to defeat them when 
they do occur ; but do not refuse me the irons, and the 
meltings now, because I may totally lose sight of all 
moderation hereafter. Leave hereafter to "the spirit 
and the wisdom of hereafter ; and do not be niggardly 
now, from the apprehension that men as wise as you 
should be profuse in times to come. 

You forget, Brother Abraham, that it is a vast art 
(where quarrels cannot be avoided) to turn the public 
opinion in your favour and to the prejudice of jour en- 
emy ; a vast privilege to feel that you are in the right, 
and to make him feel he is in the wrong ; a privilege 
which makes you more than a man, and your antago- 
nist less ; and often secures victory, by convincing 
him who contends, that he must submit to injustice if 
he submits to defeat. Open every rank in the army 
and navy to the Catholic ; let him purchase at the 
same price as the Protestant (if either Catholic or Pro- 
testant can purchase such refined pleasures) the priv- 
ilege of hearing Lord Castlereagh speak for three 
hours ; keep his clergy from starving, soften some of 
the most odious powers of the t«thing-man, and you 
will for ever lay this formidable question to rest. But 
if I am wrong, and you must quarrel at last, quarrel 
upon just rather than upon unjust grounds ; divide the 
Catholic, and unite the Protestant, be just, and your 
own exertions will be more formidable and their exer- 
tions less formidable ; be just, and you will take away 
from their party all the best and wisest understand- 
ings of both persuasions, aud knit them firmly to your 
own cause, "■' Thrice is he armed who has his quarrel 



316 



WORKS OF THE REV. SIDNEY SMITH. 



just i } and ten times as much may he be taxed. In the 
beginning of my war, however destitute of common 
sense, every mob will roar, and every lord of the bed- 
chamber address ; but if you are engaged in a war 
that is to last for years, and to require important sac- 
rifices, take care to make the justice of your case so 
clear and so obvious, that it cannot be mistaken by 
the most illiterate country gentleman who rides the 
earth. Nothing, in fact, can be so grossly absurd as the 
argument which says, I will deny justice to you now, 
because I suspect future injustice from you. At this 
rate, you may lock a man up in your stable, and refuse 
to let him out because you suspect that he has an in- 
tention, at some future period, of robbing your hen- 
roost. You may horse-whip him at Lady-day, be- 
cause you believe he will affront you at Midsummer. 
You may commit a great evil, to guard against a less, 
which is merely contingent, and may never happen. 
You may do what you have done a century ago in Ire- 
land, made the Catholics worse than Helots, because 
you suspected that they might hereafter aspire to be 
more than fellow-citizens ; rendering their sufferings 
certain from your jealousy, while yours were only 
doubtful from their ambition; an ambition sure to be 
excited by the very measures which were taken to 
prevent it. 

The physical strength of the Catholics will not be 
greater because you give them a share of political 
power. You may, by these means, turn rebels into 
friends ; but I do not see how you make rebels more 
formidable. If they taste of the honey of lawful pow- 
er, they will love the hive from whence they procure 
it ; if they will struggle with us like men in the same 
state for civil influence, we are safe. All that I dread 
is, the physical strength of four millions of men com- 
bined with an invading French army. If you are to 
quarrel at last with this enormous population, still put 
it off as long as you can ; you must gain, and cannot 
lose, by the delay. The state of Europe cannot be 
worse ; the conviction which the Catholics entertain 
of your tyranny and injustice cannot be more alarm- 
ing, nor the opinions of your own people more divid- 
ed. Time, which produces such effect upon brass and 
marble, may inspire one minister with modesty, and 
another with compassion ; every circumstance may be 
better ; some certainly will be so, none can be worse ; 
and, after all, the evil may never happen. 

You have got hold, I perceive, of all the vulgar Eng- 
lish stories respecting the hereditary transmission of 
forfeited property, and seriously believe that every 
Catholic beggar wears the terriers of his father's land 
next his skin, and is only waiting for better times to 
cut the throat of the Protestant professor, and get 
drunk in the hall of his ancestors. There is one irre- 
sistible answer to this mistake, and that is, that the 
forfeited lands are purchased indiscriminately by Ca- 
tholic and Protestant, and that the Catholic purchaser 
never objects to such a title. Now the land (so pur- 
chased by a Catholic) is either his own family estate, 
or it is not. If it is, you suppose him so desirous of 
coming into possession, that he resorts to the double 
method of rebellion and purchase ; if it is not his own 
family estate of which he becomes the purchaser, you 
suppose him first to purchase, then to rebel, in order 
to defeat the purchase. These things may happen in 
Ireland ; but it is totally impossible they can happen 
any where else. In fact, what land can any man of 
any sect purchase in Ireland, but forfeited property ? 
In all other oppressed countries which I have ever 
heard of, the rapacity of the conqueror was bounded 
by the territorial limits in which the objects of his av- 
arice were contained ; but Ireland has been actually 
confiscated twice over, as a cat is twice killed by a 
wicked parish-boy. 

I admit there is a vast luxury in selecting a particu- 
lar set of Christians, and in worrying them as a boy 
worries a puppy-dog ; it is an amusement in which all 
the young English are brought up from their earliest 
days. I like the idea of saying to men who use a dif- 
ferent hassock from me, that till they change their 
hassock, they shall never be colonels, aldermen, or 
Parliament-men. While I am gratifying my personal 
insolence respecting religious forms, I fondle myself 



into an idea that I am religious, and that I am .toing 
my duty in the most exemplary (as I certainly am in 
the most easy) way. But then, my good Abraham, 
this sport, admirable as it is, is become, with respect 
to the Catholics, a little dangerous; and if we are not 
extremely careful in taking the amusement, we shall 
tumble into the holy water, and be drowned. As it 
seems necessary to your idea of an established church 
to have somebody to worry and torment, suppose we 
were to select for this purpose William Wiiberforce, 
Esq., and the patent Christians of Clapham. We 
shall by this expedient enjoy the same opportunity for 
cruelty and injustice, without being exposed to the 
same risks ; we will compel them to abjure vital cler- 
gymen by a public test, to deny that the said William 
Wiiberforce has any power of working miracles, 
touching for barrenness or any other infirmity, or that 
he is endowed with any preternatural gift whatever. 
We will swear them to the doctrine of good works, 
compel them to preach common sense, and to hear it ; 
to frequent bishops, deans, and other high church- 
men ; and to appear (once in the quarter at least) at 
some melodrame, opera, pantomime, or other light 
scenical representation ; in short, we will gratify the 
love of insolence and power; we will enjoy the old or- 
thodox sport of witnessing the impotent anger of men 
compelled to submit to civil degradation, or to sacri- 
fice their notions of truth to ours. And all this we 
may do without the slightest risk, because their num- 
bers are (as yet) not very considerable. Cruelty and 
injustice must, of course, exist ; but wky connect 
them with danger ? Wby r torture a bull-dog when 
you can get a frog or a rabbit ? I am sure my propo- 
sal will meet with universal approbation. Do not be 
apprehensive of any opposition from ministers. If 
it is a case of hatred, we are sure that one man will 
defend it by the Gospel ; if it abridges human freedom, 
we know that another will find precedents for it in the 
Revolution. 

In the name of Heaven, what are we to gain by suf- 
fering Ireland to be rode by that faction which now 
predominates over it ! Why are we to endanger our 
own church and state, not for 500,000 Episcopalians 
but for ten or twelve great Orange families, who have 
been sucking the blood of that country for these hun- 
dred years last past ? and the lolly of the Orangemen* 
in playing this game themselves, is almost as absurd 
as ours in playing it for tbem. They ought to have 
the sense to see that their business now is to keep 
quietly the lands and beeves of which" the fathers of 
the Catholics were robbed in the days of yore : they 
must give to their descendants the sop of political 
power; by contending with them for names, they will 
lose realities, and be compelled to beg their potatoes 
in a foreign land, abhorred equally by the English, 
who have witnessed their oppression, and by the Ca- 
tholic Irish, who have smarted under them. 



LETTER IV. 

Then comes Mr. Isaac Hawkins Brown (the gentle- 
man who dancedf so badly at the Court of Naples), 
and asks, if it is not an anomaly to .educate men in 
another religion than your own? It certainly is our 
duty to get rid of error, and above all, of religious 
error ; but this is not to be done per saltum, or the 
measure will miscarry, like the queen. It may be 
very easy to dance away the royal embryo of a great 



* This remark begins to be sensibly felt in Ireland 
The Protestants in Ireland are fast coming over to the Ca 
tholic cause. 

t In the third year of his present majesty, and in the 30th 
of his own age, Mr. Isaac Hawkins Brown, then upon his 
travels, danced one evening at the court of Naples. His 
dress was a volcano silk with lava buttons. Whether (as 
the Neapolitan wits said) he had studied dancing under St. 
Vitus, or whether David, dancing in a linen vest, was his 
model, is not known ; hut Mr. Brown danced with such in- 
conceivable alacrity and vigour, that he threw the Queen 
of Naples into convulsions of laughter, which terminated 
in a miscarriage, and changed the dynasty of the Neapoli- 
tan throne. 



PETER PLYMlEY ; S LETTERS. 



317 



kingdom ; but Mr. Hawkins Brown must look before 
he leaps, when his object is to crush an opposite sect 
in religion; false steps aid the one effect as much 
as they are fatal to the other ; it will require 
not only the lapse of Mr. Hawkins Brown, but the 
lapse of centuries, before the absurdities of the Catho- 
lic religion are laughed at as much as they deserve to 
be ; but surely, in the mean time^ the Catholic reli- 
gion is better than none ; four millions of Catholics 
are better than four millions of wild beasts ; two hun- 
dred priests, educated by our own government, are 
better than the same number educated by the man 
who means to destroy us. 

The whole sum now appropriated by government to 
the religious education of four millions of Christians is 
13,000i!. ; a sum about one hundred times as large be- 
ing appropriated in the same country to about one- 
eighth part of this number of Protestants. When it 
was proposed to raise this grant from 8,000Z. to 
13,000Z., its present amount, this sum was objected to 
by that most indulgent of Christians, Mr. Spencer Per- 
ceval, as enormous ; he himself having secured for 
his own eating and drinking, and the eating and 
drinking of the Master and Miss Percevals, the rever- 
sionary sum of 21,000Z., a-year of the public money, 
and having just failed in a desperate and rapacious 
attempt to secure to himself for life the revenues of 
the Duchy of Lancaster : and the best of it is, that 
this minister, after abusing his predecessors for their 
impious bounty to the Catholics, has found himself 
compelled, from the apprehension of immediate dan- 
ger, to grant the sum in question ; thus dissolving his 
pearl* in vinegar, and destroying all the value of the 
gift by the virulence and reluctance with which it was 
granted. 

I hear from some persons in Parliament, and from 
others in the sixpenny societies for debate, a great 
deal about unalterable laws passed at the Revolution. 
When I hear any man talk of an unalterable law, the 
only effect it produces upon me is to convince me that 
he is au unalterable fool. A law passed when there 
were Germany, Spain, Russia, Sweden, Holland, Por- 
tugal, and Turkey ; when there was a disputed succes- 
sion ; when four or five hundred acres were won and 
lost after ten years' hard fighting ; when armies were 
commanded by the sons of kings, and campaigns pass- 
ed in an interchange of civil letters and ripe fruit ; and 
for these laws, when the whole state of the world is 
completely changed, we are now, according to my 
Lord Hawkesbury, to hold ourselves ready to perish. 
It is no mean misfortune, in times like these, to be 
forced to say any thing about such men as Lord 
Hawkesbury, and to be reminded that we are govern- 
ed by them ; but as I am driven to it, I must take the 
liberty of observing, that the wisdom and liberality of 
my Lord Hawkesbury are of that complexion which 
always shrinks from the present exercise of these vir- 
tues, by praising the splendid examples of them in 
ages past. If he had lived at such periods, he would 
have opposed the Revolution by praising the Refor- 
mation, and the Reformation by speaking handsomely 
of the crusades. He gratifies his natural antipathy to 
great and courageous measures, by playing off the wis- 
dom and courage which have ceased to influence hu- 
man affairs against that wisdom and courage which 
living men would employ for present happiness. Be- 
sides, it happens unfortunately for the warden of the 
Cinque Ports, that to the principal incapacities under 
which the Irish suffer, they were subjected after that 
. great and glorious revolution, to which we are indebt 
ed for so many blessings, and his lordship for theter 
jmination of so many periods. The Catholics were not 
excluded from the Irish House of Commons, or military 
commands, before the 3d and 4th of William and 
Mary, and the 1st and 2nd of Queen Anne. 

If the great mass of the people, environed as they 
are on every side with Jenkinsons, Percevals, Mel- 
villes, and other perils, were to pray for divine illumi- 
nation and aid, what more could Providence in its 

* Perfectly ready at the same time to follow the other 
half of Cleopatra's example, and fo swallow the solution 
himself. 



mercy do than send them the example of Scotland ? 
For what a length of years was it attempted to compel 
the Scotch to change their religion : horse, foot, artil- 
lery, and armed prebendaries, were sent out after the 
Presbyterian parsons and their congregations The 
Percevals of those days called for blood ; this call is 
never made in vain, and blood was shed; but to the 
astonishment and horror of the Percevals of those 
days, they could not introduce the Book of Common 
Prayer, nor prevent that metaphysical people from 
going to heaven their true way, instead of our true 
way. With a little oatmeal for food, and a little sul- 
phur for friction, allaying cutaneous irritation with the 
one hand, and holding his Calvinistical creed in the 
other, Sawney ran away to his flinty hills, sung his 
psalm out of tune his own way, and listened to his 
sermon of two hours long, amid the rough and im- 
posing melancholy of the tallest thistles. But Sawney 
brought up hisunbreeched offspring in a cordial hatred 
of his oppressors ; and Scotland was as much a part oi 
the weakness of England then as Ireland is at the 
present moment. The true and the only remedy Avas 
applied; the Scotch were suffered to worship God 
after their own tiresome manner, without pain, pe- 
nalty, and privation. No lightnings descended from 
heaven ; the country was not ruined ; the world not 
yet come to an end ; the dignitaries, who foretold all 
these consequences, are utterly forgotten ; and Scot- 
land has ever since been an increasing source of 
strength to Great Britain. In the six hundredth year 
of our empire over Ireland, we are making laws to 
transport a man, if he is found out of his house after 
eight o'clock at night. That this is necessary, I know 
too well ; but tell me why it is necessary ? " It is not 
necessary in Greece, where the Turks are masters. 

Are you aware, that there is at this moment an uni- 
versal clamour throughout the whole of Ireland against 
the union ? It is now one month since I returned from 
that country ; I have never seen so extraordinary, so 
alarming, and so rapid a change in the sentiments of 
any people. Those who disliked the union before, 
are quite furious against it now ; those who doubted 
doubt no more ; those who were friendly to it have 
exchanged that friendship for the most rooted aver- 
sion ; in the midst of all this (which is by far the most 
alarming symptom) , there is the strongest disposition 
on the part of the northern dissenters to unite with the 
Catholics, irritated by the faithless injustice with 
which they have been treated. If this combination 
does take place (mark what I say to you) , you will 
have meetings all over Ireland for the cry of No Union; 
that cry will spread like wildfire, and blaze on every 
opposition ; and if this is the case, there is no use in 
mincing the matter, Ireland is gone, and the death- 
blow of England is struck ; and this event may happen 
instantly— before Mr. Canning and Mr. Hookham 
Frere have turned Lord Howick's last speech into 
doggerel rhyme ; before ' the near and dear relations' 
have received another quarter of their pension, or Mr. 
Perceval conducted the curates' salary bill safely to a 
third reading. — If the mind of the English people, 
cursed as they now are with that madness of religious 
dissension which has been breathed into them for the 
purpose of private ambition, can be alarmed by any 
remembrances, and warned by any events, they should 
never forget how nearly Ireland was lost to this coun- 
try during the American war ; that it was saved 
merely by the jealousy of the Protestant Irish towards 
the Catholics, then a much more insignificant and 
powerless body than they now are. The Catholic and 
the dissenter have since combined together against 
you. Last war, the winds, those ancient and unsubsi- 
dized allies of England; the winds, upon which En- 
glish ministers depend as much for saving kingdoms as 
washerwomen do for drying clothes ; the winds stood 
your friends ; the French could only get into Ireland 
in small numbers, and the rebels were defeated. Since 
then, all the remaining kingdoms of Europe have been 
destroyed ; and the Irish see that their independence 
is gone, without having received any single one of 
those advantages which they were taught to expect 
from the sacrifice. All good things were to flow from 
the union ; they have none of them gained any thing. 



31S 



WORKS OF THE REV. SIDNEY SMITH. 



Every man's pride is wounded by it ; no man's interest 
is promoted. In the seventh year of that union, four 
million Catholics, lured by all kinds of promises to 
yield up the separate dignity and sovereignty of their 
country, are forced to squabble with such a man as 
Mr. Spencer Perceval for five thousand pounds with 
which to educate their children in their own mode of I 
worship ; he, the same Mr. Spencer, having secured to 
his own Protestant self a reversionary portion of the 
public money amounting to four times Jhat sum. A 
senior proctor of the University of Oxford, the head 
of a house, or the examining chaplain to a bishop, 
may believe these things can last ; but every man of 
the world, whose understanding has been exercised in 
the business of life, must see (and see with a breaking 
heart) that they will soon come to a fearful termi- 
nation. 

Our conduct to Ireland, during the whole of this 
war, has been that of a man who subscribes to hospi- 
tals, weeps at charity sermons, carries out broth and 
blankets to beggars, and then comes home and beats 
his wife and children. We had compassion for the vic- 
tims of all other oppression and injustice, except our 
own. If Switzerland was threatened, away went a 
treasury clerk with a hundred thousand pounds for 
Switzerland ; large bags of money were kept constant- 
ly under sailing orders ; upon the slightest demonstra- 
tion towards Naples, down went Sir William Hamil- 
ton upon his knees, and prayed for the love of St. Ja- 
nuarius they would help us off with a little money ; all 
the arts of Machiavel were resorted to, to persuade 
Europe to borrow ; troops were sent off in all direc- 
tions to save the Catholic and Protestant world : the 
pope himself was guarded by a regiment of English 
dragoons ; if the Grand Lama had been at hand, he 
would have had another ; every Catholic clergyman, 
who had the good fortune to be neither English nor 
Irish, was immediately provided with lodgings, soup, 
crucifix, missal, chapel-beads, relics, and holy water ; 
if Turks had landed, Turks would have received an 
order from the treasury for coffee, opium, korans, and 
seraglios. In the midst of all this fury of saving and 
defending, this crusade for conscience and Christiani- 
ty, there was an universal agreement among all de- 
scriptions of people to continue every species of in- 
ternal persecution ; to deny at home every just right 
which had been denied before ; to pummel poor Dr. 
Abraham Rees and his dissenters ; and to treat the 
unhappy Catholics of Ireland as if their tongues were 
mute, their heels cloven, their nature brutal, and de- 
signedly subjected by Providence to their Orange mas- 
ters. 

How would my admirable brother, the Rev. Abra- 
ham Plymley, like to be marched to a Catholic chapel, 
to be sprinkled with the sanctified contents of a pump, 
to hear a number of false quantities in the Latin 
tongue, and to see a number of persons occupied in 
making right angles upon the breast and forehead? — 
And if all this would give you so much pain, what 
right have you to march Catholic soldiers to a place of 
worship where there is no aspersion, no rectangular 
gestures, and where they understand every word they 
hear, having first, in order to get him to enlist, made 
a solemn promise to the contrary? Can you wonder, 
after this, that the Catholic priest stops the recruiting 
in Ireland, as he is now doing to a most alarming de- 
gree? 

The late question concerning military rank did not 
individually affect the lowest persons of the Catholic 
persuasion ; but do you imagine they do not sympa- 
thize with the honour and disgrace of their superiors? 
Do you think that satisfaction and dissatisfaction do 
not travel down from Lord Fingal to the most potato- 
less Catholic in Ireland, and that the glory or shame 
of the sect is not felt by many more than these condi- 
tions personally and corporally affect ? Do you sup- 
pose that the detection of Sir H. M. and the disap- 
pointment of Mr. Perceval in the matter of the Duchy 
of Lancaster, did not affect every dabbler in public 
property? Depend upon it these things were felt 
through all the gradations of small plunderers, down 
to him who niches a pound of tobacco from the king's 
warehouses ; while, on the contrary, the acquittal of 



any noble and official thief would not fail to diffuse the 
most heartfelt satisfaction over the larcenous and 
burglarious world. Observe, I do not say because ih^ 
lower Catholics are affected by what concerns their 
superiors, that they are not affected by whal concerns 
themselves. There is no disguising the horrid truth ; 
there must be some relaxation with respect to tithe : this 
is the cruel and heart-rending price which must be paid 
for national preservation. 1 feel how little existence 
will be worth having, if any alteration, however slight, 
is made hi the property of Irish rectors ; I am con- 
scious how much such changes must affect the daily 
and hourly comforts of every Englishman ; I shall 
feel too happy if they leave Europe untouched, and 
are not ultimately fatal to the destinies of America ; 
but I am madly bent upon keeping foreign enemies out 
of the British empire, and my limited understanding 
presents me with no other means of effecting my ob- 
ject. 

You talk of waiting till another reign, before any al- 
teration is made ; a proposal full of good sense ami 
good nature, if the measure in question were to pull 
down St. James's Palace, or to alter Kew Gardens. — 
Will Bonaparte agree to put off his intrigues, and his 
invasion of Ireland ? If, so, I will overlook the ques- 
tion of justice, and, finding the danger suspended, 
agree to the delay. I sincerely hope this reign may 
last many years, yet the delay of a single session of 
Parliament may be fatal ; but if another year elapses 
without some serious concession made to the Catho- 
lics, I believe, before God, that all future pledges and 
concessions will be made in vain. I do hot think that 
peace will do you any good under such circumstanees; 
if Bonaparte gives you a respite, it will only be to get 
ready the gallows on which he means to hang you. — 
The Catholic and the dissenter can unite in peace as 
well as war. If they do, the gallows is ready; and 
your executioner, in spite of the most solemn promi- 
ses, will turn you off the next hour. 

With every disposition to please (where to please 
within fair and rational limits is a high duty), it is 
impossible for public men to be long silent about the 
Catholics ; pressing evils are not got rid of because 
they are not talked of. A man may command his 
family to say nothing more about the stone, and sur-. 
gical operation ; but the poderous malice still lies upon 
the nerve, and gets so big, that the patient breaks his 
own law of silence, clamours for the knife, and expires 
under its late operation. Believe me, you talk folly, 
when you talk of suppressing the Catholic question. I 
wish to God the case admitted of such a remedy : bad 
as it is, it does not admit of it. If the wants of the 
Catholics are not heard in the manly tones of Lord 
Grehville, or the servile drawl of Lord Castlereagh, 
they will be heard ere long in the madness of mobs, 
and the conflicts of armed men. 

I observe, it is now universally the fashion to speak 
of the first personage in the state as the great obstacle 
to the measure. In the first place, I am not bound to 
believe such rumours because I hear them ; and in the 
next place, I object to such language as unconstitu- 
tional. Whoever retains his situation in the ministry, 
while the incapacities of the Catholics remain, is the 
advocate of those incapacities ; and to him, and to 
him only, am I to look for responsibility. But waive 
this question of the Catholics, and put a general case : 
How is a minister of this country to act when the 
conscientious scruples of his sovereign prevent the 
execution of a measure deemed by him absolutely ne- 
cessary to the safety of the country ? His conduct is 
quite clear— he should resign. But what is his succes-- 
sor to do ?— Resign. But is the king to be left with-: 
out ministers, andTis he in this manner to be compelled 
to act against his own conscience ? Before I answer 
this, pray tell me in my turn, Avhat better defence is 
there against the machinations of a wicked, or the 
errors of a weak monarch, than the impossibility of 
fmding a minister who will lend himself to vice and 
folly ? Every English monarch, in such a predica- 
ment, would sacrifice his opinions and views to such 
a clear expression of the public will; and it is one me« 
thod in which the constitution aims at bringing about 
such a sacrifice. You may say, if you please, the 



ii 



PETER PLYMLEY'S LETTERS. 



819 



ruler of a state is forced to give up his object, when 
the natural love of place and power will tempt no one 
to assist him in its attainment. This may be force — 
but it is force without injury, and therefore without 
blame. I am not to be beat out of these obvious rea- 
sonings, and ancient constitutional provisions, by the 
term conscience. There is no fantasy, however wild, 
that a man may not persuade himself that he cherish- 
es from motives of conscience ; eternal war against 
impious France, or rebellious America, or Catholic 
Spain, may in times to come be scruples of conscience. 
One English monarch may") from scruples of con- 
science, wish to abolish every trait of religious perse- 
cution; another monarch may deem it his absolute 
and indispensable duty to make a slight provision for 
dissenters out of the revenues of the Church of Eng- 
land. So that you see, Brother Abraham, there are 
cases where it would be the duty of the best and most 
loyal subjects to oppose the conscientious scruples of 
their sovereign, still taking care that their actions 
were constitutional, and their modes respectful. Then 
you come upon me with personal questions, and say, 
that no such dangers are to be apprehended now un- 
der our present gracious sovereign, of whose good 
qualities we must be all so well convinced. All these 
sorts of discussions I beg leave to decline ; what I 
have said upon constitutional topics, I mean of course 
for general, not for particular application. I agree 
with you in all the good you have said of the powers 
that be, and I avail myself of the opportunity of point- 
ing out general dangers to the constitution, at a mo- 
ment when we are so completely exempted from their 
present influence. I cannot finish this letter without 
expressing my surprise and pleasure at your abuse of 
the servile addresses poured, in upon the throne ; nor 
can I conceive a greater disgust to a monarch with a 
true English heart, than to see such a question as that 
of Catholic emancipation argued, not with a reference 
to its justice or its importance, but universally con- 
sidered to be of no farther consequence than as it af- 
fects his own private feelings. That these sentiments 
should be mine, is not wonderful ; but how they come 
to be yours, does, I confess, fill me with surprise. 
Are you moved by the arrival of the Irish brigade at 
Antwerp, and the amorous violence which awaits 
Mrs. Plymley? 



LETTER V. 

'Dear Abraham, 

I never met a parson in my life who did not con- 
sider the Corporation and Test Acts as the great bul- 
warks of the Church ; and yet it is just now sixty-four 
[years since bills of indemnity to destroy their penal 
j effects, or in other words, to repeal them, have been 
(passed annually as a matter of course. 

!Heu vatum ignarce mentes. 
These bulwarks, without which no clergyman thinks 
( he could sleep with his accustomed soundness, have 
factually not been in existence since any man now 
Hiving has taken holy orders. Every year the indem- 
nity act pardons past breaches of these two laws, and 
(•prevents any fresh actions of informers from coming 
jjto a conclusion before the period for the next indem- 
nity bill amves; so that these penalties, by which 
ifalone the church remains in existence, have not had 
one moment's operation for sixty-four years. You 
twill say the legislature, during the whole of this pe- 
riod, has reserved to itself the discretion of suspend- 
ing, or not suspending. But had not the legislature 
■jthe right of re-enacting, if it was necessary ? And 
laow, when you have kept the rod over these people 
[(with the most scandalous abuse of all principle) for 
'Sixty-four years, and not found it necessary to strike 
tpnce, is not that the best of all reasons why the rod 
'should be laid aside ? You talk to me of a very valua- 
ble hedge running across your fields which you would 
|aot part with on any account. I go down, expecting 
jfco find a limit impervious to cattle, and highly useful 
Jr.or the preservation of property ; but, to my utter 
Ibstonishment, I find that the hedge was cut down half 



a century ago, and that every year the shoots are 
clipped the moment they appear above ground: it 
appears, upon farther inquiry, that the hedge never 
ought to have existed at all ; that it originated in the 
malice of antiquated quarrels, and was cut down be- 
cause it subjected you to vast inconvenience, and 
broke up your intercourse with a country absolutely 
necessary to your existence. If the remains of this 
hedge serve only to keep up an irritation in your neigh- 
bours, and to remind them of the feuds of former 
times, good nature and good sense teach you that you 
ought to grub it up, and cast it into the oven. This is 
the exact state of these two laws; and yet it is made 
a great argument against concession to the Catholics, 
that it involves their repeal ; which is to say, Do not 
make me relinquish a folly that will lead to my ruin ; 
because, if you do, I must give up other follies ten 
times greater than this. 

I confess, with all our bulwarks and hedges, it mor- 
tifies me to the very quick, to contrast with our match- 
less stupidity and inimitable folly, the conduct of Bo- 
naparte upon religious persecution. At the moment 
when we are tearing the crucifixes from the necks of 
the Catholics, and washing pious mud from the fore- 
heads of the Hindoos ; at that moment this man is as- 
sembling the very Jews at Paris, and endeavouring to 
give them stability and importance. I shall never be 
reconciled to mending shoes in America ; but I see it 
must be my lot, and I will then take a dreadful revenge 
upon Mr. Perceval, if I catch him preaching within ten 
miles of me. I cannot for the soul of me conceive 
whence this man has gained his notions of Christiani- 
ty ; he has the most evangelical charity for errors in 
arithmetic, and the most inveterate malice against er- 
rors in conscience. While he rages against those 
whom, in the true spirit of the Gospel he ought to in- 
dulge, he forgets the only instance of severity which 
that Gospel contains, and leaves the jobbers, and con- 
tractors, and money-changers at their seats, without a 
single stripe. 

You cannot imagine, you say, that England will ev- 
er be ruined and conquered ; and for no other reason 
that I can find, but because it seems so very odd it 
should be ruined and conquered. Alas! so reasoned. 
in their time, the Austrian, Russian and Prussian 
Plymleys. But the English are brave ; so were all 
these nations. You might get together an hundred 
thousand men individually brave ; but without generals 
capable of commanding such a machine, it would be as 
useless as a first-rate-man-of-war manned by Oxford 
clergymen, or Parisian shopkeepers. I do not say this 
to the disparagement of English officers ; they have 
had no means of acquiring experience ; but I do say it 
to create alarm ; for we do not appear to me to be 
half alarmed enough, or to entertain that sense of our 
danger which leads to the most obvious means of self- 
defence. As for the spirit of the peasantry, in making 
a gallant defence behind hedge-rows, and through 
plate-racks and hen-coops, highly as I think of their 
bravery, I do not know any nation in Europe so likely 
to be struck with panic as the English uid this from 
their total unacquaintance with the science of war. — 
Old wheat and beans blazing for twenty miles round ; 
cart mares shot ; sows of Lord Somerville's breed run- 
ning wild over the country ; the minister of the parish 
wounded solely in his hinder parts; Mrs. Plymley in 
fits ; all these scenes of war an Austrian or a Russian 
has seen three or four times over ; but it is now three 
centuries since an English pig has fallen in a fair battle 
upon English ground, or a farm-house been rifled, or a 
clergyman's wife been subjected to any other propos- 
als of love than the connubial endearments of her sleek 
and orthodox mate. The old edition of Plutarch's 
Lives, which lies in the corner of your parlour window, 
has contributed to work you up to the most romantic 
expectations of our Roman behaviour. You are per- 
suaded that Lord Amherst will defend Kew Bridge 
like Codes ; that some maid of honour will break away 
from her captivity, and swim over the Thames ; that 
the Duke of York will bum his capitulating hand ; and 
little Mr. Sturges Bourne* give forty years' purchase 

*There is nothing more objectionable in Plymley'6 Letters 



WORKS OF THE REV. SIDNEY SMITH. 



for Moulsham Hall, while the French are encamped 
upon it. I hope we shall witness all this, if the French 
do come ; but in the mean time I am so enchanted 
with the ordinary English behaviour of these invalua- 
ble persons, that I earnestly pray no opportunity may 
be given them for Roman valour, and for those very 
un-Roman pensions which they would all, of course, 
take especial care to claim in consequence. But what- 
ever was our conduct, if every ploughman was as 
great a hero as he who was called from his oxen to 
save Rome from her enemies, I should still say, that at 
such a crisis you want the affections of all your sub- 
jects in both islands; there is no spirit which you 
must alienate, no heart you must avert ; every man 
must feel he has a country, and that there is an urgent 
and pressing cause why he should expose himself to 
death. 

The effects of penal laws, in matters of religion, are 
never confined to those limits in which the legislature 
intended they should be placed ; it is not only that I 
am excluded from certain offices and dignities because 
I am a Catholic, but the exclusion carries with it a 
certain stigma, which degrades me in the eyes of the 
monopolizing sect, and the very name of my religion 
becomes odious. These effects are so very striking in 
England, that I solemnly believe blue and red baboons 
to be more popular here than Catholics and Presbyte- 
rians; they are more understood, and there is a great- 
er disposition to do something for them. When a 
country squire hears of an ape, his first feeling is to 
give it nuts and apples ; when he hears of a dissenter, 
his immediate impulse is to commit it to the county 
jail, to shave its head, to alter its customary food, and 
to have it privately whipped. This is no caricature, 
but an accurate picture of national feelings, as they 
degrade and endanger us at this very moment. The 
Irish Catholic gentleman would bear his legal disabil- 
ities with greater temper, if these were ail he had to 
bear — if they did not enable every Protestant cheese- 
monger and tide-waiter to treat hi'm with contempt. — 
He is branded on the forehead with a red-hot iron, and 
treated like a spiritual felon, because, in the highest of 
all considerations, he is led by the noblest of all guides, 
his own disinterested conscience. 

Why are nonsense and cruelty a bit the better be- 
cause they are enacted ? If Providence, which gives 
wine and oil, had blest us with that tolerant spirit 
which makes the countenance more pleasant and the 
heart more glad than these can do ; if our statute book 
had never been defiled with such infamous laws, the 
sepulchral Spencer Perceval would have been hauled 
through the dirtiest horse-pond in Hampstead, had he 
ventured to propose them. But now persecution is 
good, because it exists ; every law which originated in 
ignorance and malice, and gratifies the passions from 
whence it sprang, we call the wisdom of our ancestors ; 
when such laws are repealed, they will be cruelty and 
madness ; till they are repealed, they are policy and 
caution. 

I was somewhat amused, with tfie imputation brought 
against the Catholics by the University of Oxford, that 
they are enemies to liberty. I immediately turned to 
my History of England, and marked as an historical 
error that passage in which it is recorded that, in the 
reign of Queen Anne, the famous decree of the Univer- 
sity of Oxford, respecting passive obedience, was or- 
dered by the House of Lords, to be burnt by the hands 
of the common hangman, as contrary to the liberty of 
the subject, and the law of the land. Nevertheless, I 
wish, whatever be the modesty of those who impute, 
that the imputation was a little more true, the Catholic 
cause would not be quite so desperate with the pre- 
sent administration. I fear, however, that the hatred 
to liberty in these poor devoted wretches may ere long 
appear more doubtful than it is at present to the vice- 
chancellor and his clergy, inflamed as they doubtless 
are, with classical examples of republican virtue, and 
panting as they always have been, to reduce the pow- 
er of the crown within narrower and safer limits. What 

than the abuse of Mr. Sturges Bourne, who is an honourable 
able, and exceliect person ; but such are the malevolent effects 
of party spirit. 



mistaken zeal to attempt to connect one religion with 
freedom and another with slavery .' Who laid the foun- 
dations of English liberty l . What was the mixed reli- 
gion of Switzerland i What has the Protestant reli- 
gion done for liberty in Denmark, in Sweden, through- 
out the north of Germany and Prussia ? The purest 
religion in the worid, in my humble opinion, is the re- 
ligion of the Church of England ; for its preservation 
(so far as it is exercised without intruding upon the 
liberties of others), I am ready at this moment to 
venture my present life, and but through that religion 
I have no hopes of any other ; yet I am not forced to 
be silly because I am pious; nor will I ever join hi 
eulogiums on my faith, which every man of common 
reading and common sense can so easily refute. 

You have either done too much for the Catholics 
(worthy Abraham), or too little ; if you had intended 
to refuse them political power, you should have refused 
them civil rights. After you had enabled them to ac- 
quire property, after you had conceded to them all 
you did concede in 78 and 93, the rest is wholly out of 
your power ; you may choose whether you will give 
the rest in an honourable or a disgraceful mode, but it 
is utterly out of your power to withhold it. 

In the last year, land to the amount of eight hundred 
thousand pounds was purchased by the Catholics hi 
Ireland. Do you think it possible to be-Perceval, and 
be-Canning, and be-Castlereagh such a body of men as 
this out of their common rights and their sense ? Mr. 
George Canning may laugh and joke at the idea of Pro- 
testant bailiffs "ravishing Catholic ladies, under the 9th 
clause of the sunset bill ; but if some better remedy is 
not applied to the distractions of Ireland than the 
jocularity of Mr. Canning, they will soon put an end to 
his pension, and to the pension of those : near and dear 
relatives,' for whose eating, drinking, washing, and clo- 
thing, every- man in the United Kingdoms now pays i 
his two-pence or three-pence a year. You may call 
these observations coarse, if you please ; but I have j 
no idea that the Sophias and Carolines of any man j 
breathing are to eat national veal, to drink public tea, 
to wear treasury ribands, and then that we are to be 
told that it is coarse to animadvert upon this pitiful 
and eleemosynary splendour. If this is right, why not 
mention it ! If it is wrong, why should not he who 
enjoys the ease of supporting his sisters in this-manner 
bear the shame it ? Every body seems hitherto to 
have spared a man who never spares any body. 

As for the enormous wax candles, and superstitious 
mummeries, and painted jackets of the Catholic 
priests, I fear them not. Tell me that the world will 
return again under the influence of the small-pox ; that 
Lord Castlereagh will hereafter oppose the power of J 
the court ; that Lord Howick and Mr. Grattan will do 
each of them a mean and dishonourable action ; that 
any body who has heard Lord Rcdesdale speak once 
will knowingly and willingly hear him again , thatl 
Lord Eldon has assented to the fact of two and twol 
making four, without shedding tears, or expressing the l 
smallest doubt or scruple ; tell me any other thing ab- [ 
surd or incredible ; but, for the love of common sense, 
let me hear no more of the danger to be apprehended 
from the general diffusion of Popery. It is too absurd 
to be reasoned upon ; every man feels it is nonsense • 
when he hears it stated, and so does every man while - 
he is stating it. 

I cannot imagine why the friends to the church esM 
tablishment should entertain such an horror of seeing . 
the doors of Parliament flung open to Catholics, and 
view so passively the enjoyment of that right by the 
Presbyterians, and by every other species of dissenter. 
In their tenets, in their church government, in the na- 
ture of their endowments, the dissenters are infinitely 
more distant from the Church of England than Catho- 
lics are ; yet the dissenters have never been excluded 
from Parliament. There are 45 members in one house 
and 16 in the other, who always are dissenters. There 
is no law which would prevent every member of the 
Lords and Commons from being dissenters. ThB 
Catholics could not bring into Parliament half the num- 
ber of Scotch members ; and jret one exclusion is of 
such immense importance, because it has taken place; 
and the other no human being thinks of, because no 



PETER PLYMLEY' LETTERS. 



321 



one is accustomed to it. I have often thought, if the 
wisdom of our ancestors had excluded all persons with 
red hair from the House of Commons, of the throes and 
convulsions it would occasion to restore them to their 
natural rights. What mobs and riots would it produce ? 
To what infinite abuse and obloquy would the capillary 
patriot be exposed ? What wormwood would distil 
from Mr. Perceval, what froth would drop from Mr. 
Camming ; how (I will not say my, but our Lord 
Hawkesbury, for he belongs to us all,) how our Lord 
Hawkesbury, would work away about the hair of 
King William and Lord Somers, and the authors of the 
great and glorious Revolution ; how Lord Elton would 
appeal to the Deity and his own virtues, and to the 
hair of his children : some would say that red-haired 
men were superstitious ; some would prove they were 
atheists ; they would be petitioned against as the 
friends of slavery, and the advocates for revolt ; in 
short, such a corrupter of the heart and the under- 
standing is the spirit of persecution, that these unfor- 
tunate people (conspired against by their fellow-sub- 
jects of every complexion), if they did not emigrate to 
countries where hair of another colour was persecuted, 
would be driven to the falsehood of perukes, or the 
hypocrisy of the Tricosian fluid. 

As for the dangers of the church (in spite of the 
staggering events which have lately taken place), I 
have not yet entirely lost my confidence in the power 
of common sense, and I believe the church to be in no 
danger at all ; but if it is, that danger is not from the 
Catholics, but from the Methodists, and from that pa- 
tent Christianity which has been for some time manu- 
facturing at Clapham, to the prejudice of the old and 
admirable article prepared by the church. I would 
counsel my lords the bishops to keep their eyes up- 
on that holy village, and its hallowed vicinity ; they 
will find there a zeal in making converts far superior 
to any thing which exists among the Catholics ; a con- 
tempt for the great mass of English clergy much more 
rooted and profound ; and a regular fund to purchase 
livings for those groaning and garrulous gentlemen, 
whom they denominate (by a standing sarcasm against 
the regular church) gospel preachers, and vital cler- 
gymen. I am too firm a believer in the general pro- 
priety and respectability of the English clergy, to be- 
lieve they have much to fear either from old nonsense, 
or from new ; but if the church must be supposed to 
be in danger, I prefer that nonsense which is grown 
half venerable from time, the force of which I have 
already tried and baffled, which, at least, has some 
excuse in the dark and ignorant ages in which it ori- 
ginated. The religious enthusiasm manufactured by 
living men before my own eyes, disgusts my under- 
standing as much, influences my imagination not at all, 
and excites my apprehensions much more. 

I may have seemed to you to treat the situation of 

Sublic affairs with some degree of levity ; but I feel it 
eeply, and with nightly and daily anguish ; because I 
know Ireland ; I have known it all my life ; I love it, 
and I foresee the crisis to which it will soon be ex- 
posed. Who can doubt but that Ireland will experi- 
ence ultimately from France a treatment to which the 
conduct they have experienced from England is the 
love of a parent or a brother ? Who can doubt but 
that five years after he has got hold of the country, 
Ireland will be tossed away by' Bonaparte as a pres- 
ent to some one of his ruffian generals, who will knock 
the head of Mr. Keogh against the head of Cardinal 
Troy, shoot twenty of the most noisy blockheads of 
the Roman persuasion, wash his pug-dogs in holy 
water, and confiscate the salt butter of the Milesian 
republic to the last tub ? But what matters this ? or 
who is wise enough in Ireland to heed it ? or when had 
common sense much influence with my poor dear Irish ? 
Mr. Percival does not know the Irish ; but I 
know them, and I know that at every rash and 
mad hazard, they will break the union, revenge their 
wounded pride and their insulted religion, and fling 
themselves into the open arms of France, sure of dy- 
ing in the embrace. And now what means have you 
of guarding against this coming evil, upon which the 
future happiness ox misery of every Englishman de- 
pends? Have you a single ally in the whole world ? 



Is there a vulnerable point in the French empire where 
the astonishing resources of that people can be at- 
tracted and employed ? Have you a ministry wise 
enough to comprehend the danger, manly enough to 
believe unpleasant intelligence, honest enough to state 
their apprehensions at the peril of their places ? Is 
there any where the slightest disposition to join any 
measure of love, or conciliation, or hope, with that 
dreadful bill which the distractions of Ireland have 
rendered necessary ? At the very moment that the 
last monarchy in Europe has fallen, are we not govern- 
ed by a man of pleasantry, and a man of theology ? 
In the six hundredth year of our empire over Ireland, 
have we any memorial of ancient kindness to refer to ? 
any people, any zeal, any country on which we can 
depend? Have we any hope, but in the winds of hea- 
ven, and the tides of the sea ? any prayer to prefer 
to the Irish, but that they should forget and forgive 
their oppressors, who in the very moment that they 
are calling upon them for their exertions, solemnly as- 
sure them that the oppression shall still remain ? 

Abraham, farewell ! If I have tired you, remember 
how often you have tired me and others. I do not 
think we really differ in politics so much as you sup- 
pose ; or at least, if we do, that difference is in the 
means, and not in the end. We both Jove the consti- 
tution, respect the king, and abhor the French. But 
though you love the constitution, you would perpetu- 
ate the abuses which have been engrafted upon it ; 
though you respect the king, you would confirm his 
scruples against the Cutholics ; though you abhor the 
French, you would open to them the conquest of Ire- 
land. My method of respecting my sovereign is by 
protecting his honour, his empire, and his lasting hap- 
piness ; I evince my love of the constitution, by mak- 
ing it the guardian of all men's rights and the source 
of their freedom ; and I prove my abhorrence of the 
French, by uniting against them the disciples of every 
church in the only remaining nation in Europe. As 
for the men of whom I have been compelled, in this 
age of mediocrity, to say so much, they cannot of 
themselves be worth a moment's consideration to you, 
to me, or to any body. In a year after their death, 
they will be forgotten as completely as if they had 
never been ; and are now of no farther importance 
than as they are the mere vehicles of carrying into 
effect the common-place and mischievous prejudices 
of the times in which they live. 



LETTER VI. 
Dear Abraham, 

What amuses me the most is, to hear of the indul- 
gences which the Catholics have received, and their 
exorbitance in not being satisfied with those indulgen- 
ces : now if you complain to me that a man is obtru- 
sive and shameless in his requests, and that it is im- 
possible to bring him to reason, I must first of all hear 
the whole of your condnct towards him ; for you may 
have taken from him so much in the first instance, 
that, in spite of a long series of restitution, a vast lat- 
itude for petition may still remain behind. 

There is a village (no matter where) in which the 
inhabitants, on one day in the year, sit down to a din- 
ner prepared at the common expense ; by an extraor- 
dinary piece of tyranny (which Lord Hawkesbury 
would call the wisdom of the village ancestors), the 
inhabitants of three of the streets, about an hundred 
years ago, seized upon the inhabitants of the fourth 
street, bound them hand and foot, laid- them upon 
their backs, and compeBed them to look on while the 
rest were stuffing themselves with beef and beer ; the 
next year, the inhabitants of the persecuted street 
(though they contributed an equal quota of the ex- 
pense) were treated precisely in the same manner. 
The tyranny grew into a custom ; and (as the manner 
of our nature is) it was considered as the most sacred 
of all duties to keep these poor feUows without their 
annual dinner ; the village was so tenacious of this 
practice, that nothing could induce them to resign it* 
every enemy to it was looked upon as a disbeliever in 
Divine Providence, an£ any nefarious churchward©* 



322 



WORKS OF THE REV. SIDNEY SMITH. 



who wished to succeed in his election had nothing to 
do but to represent his antagonist as an abolitionist, in 
order to frustrate his ambition, endanger his life, and 
throw the village into a state of the most dreadful 
commotion. By degrees, however, the obnoxious 
street grew to be so well peopled, and its inhabitants 
so firmly united, that their oppressors, more afraid of 
injustice, were more disposed to be just. At the next 
dinner they are unbound, the year after allowed to sit 
upright, then a bit of bread and a glass of water ; till 
at last, after a long series of concessions, they are 
emboldened to ask, in pretty plain terms, that they 
may be allowed to sit down at the bottom of the ta- 
ble, and to fill their bellies as well as the rest. Forth- 
with a general cry of shame and scandal : ' Ten years 
ago, were you not laid upon your backs ? Don't you 
remember what a great thing you thought it to get a 
piece of bread? How thankful you were for cheese 
parings? Have you forgotten that memorable era, 
when the lord of the manor" interfered to obtain for 
you a slice of the public pudding ? And now, with an 
audacity only equalled by your ingratitude, you have 
the impudence to ask for knives and forks, and to re- 
quest, in terms too plain to be mistaken, that you may 
sit down to table with the rest, and be indulged even 
with beef and beer : there are not more than half a 
dozen dishes which we have reserved for ourselves ; 
the rest has been thrown open to you in the utmost 

Srofusion ; you have potatoes, and carrots, suet 
umplings, sops in the pan, and. delicious toast and 
water, in incredible quantities. Beef, mutton, lamb, 
pork, and veal are ours ; and if you were not the most 
restless and dissatisfied of human beings, you would 
never think of aspiring to enjoy them.' 

Is not this, my dainty Abraham, the very nonsense 
and the very insult which is talked to and practised 
upon the Catholics ? You are surprised that men who 
have tasted of partial justice should ask for perfect 
justice ; that he who has been robbed of coat and 
cloak will not be contented with the restitution of one 
of his garments. He would be a lazy blockhead if he 
were content, and I (who, though an inhabitant of 
the village, have preserved, thank God, some sense 
of justice,) most earnestly counsel these half- fed 
claimants to persevere in their just demands, till they 
are admitted to a more complete share of a dinner for 
which they pay as much as the others ; and if they 
see a little attenuated lawyer squabbling at the head 
of their opponents, let them desire him to empty his 
pockets, and to pull out all the pieces of duck, fowl, 
and pudding, which he has filched from the public 
feast, to carry home to his wife and children. 

You parade a great deal upon the vast concessions 
made by this country to the Irish before the union. I 
deny that any voluntary concession was ever made by 
England to Ireland. What did Ireland ever ask that 
was granted ? What did she ever demand that was 
refused ? How did she get her mutiny bill— a limited 
Parliament — a repeal of Poyning's law — a constitu- 
tion ? Not by the concessions of England, but by her 
fears. When Ireland asked for ail these things upon 
her knees, her petitions were rejected with Perceval- 
ism and contempt: when she demanded them with 
the voice of 60,000 armed men, they were granted with 
every mark of consternation and dismay. Ask of Lord 
Auckland the fatal consequences of trifling with such 
a people as the Irish. He himself was the organ of 
these refusals. As secretary to the lord-lieutenant, 
the insolence and the tyranny of this country passed 
through his hand. Ask him if he remembers the con- 
sequences. Ask him if he has forgotten that memo- 
Table evening, when he came down booted and mantled 
to the House of Commons, when he told the House he 
was about to set off for Ireland that night, and de- 
clared, before God, if he did not carry with him a 
compliance with all their demands, Ireland was for 
ever lost to this country. The present generation 
have forgotten this ; but I have not forgotten it ; and 
I know, hasty and undignified as the submission of 
England then was, that Lord Auckland was right, 
that the delay of a single day might very probably 
have separated the two people for ever. The terms 
submission and fear are galling terms, when applied 



from the lesser nation to the greater ; but it is the 
plain historical truth, it is the natural consequence of 
injustice, it is the predicament in which every country 
places itself which leaves such a mass of hatred and 
discontent by its side. No empire is powerful enough 
to endure it ; it would exhaust the strength of China, 
and sink it with all its mandarins and tea-kettles to 
the bottom of the deep. By refusing them justice 
now, when you are strong enough to refuse them any 
thing more than justice, you will act over again, with 
the Catholics, the same scene of mean and precipitate 
submission which disgraced you before America, and 
before the volunteers of Ireland. We shall live to 
hear the Hampstead Protestants pronouncing such ex- 
travagant panegyrics upon holy water, and paying 
such fulsome compliments to the thumbs and oifals of 
departed saints, that parties will change sentiments, 
and Lord Henry Petty and Sam Whitbread take a 
spell at no-Popery. The wisdom of Mr. Fox was alike 
employed in teaching his country justice when Ireland 
was weak, and dignity when Ireland was strong. We 
are fast pacing round the same miserable circle of 
ruin and imbecility. Alas ! where is our guide ? 

You say that Ireland is a millstone about our necks ; 
that it would be better for us if Ireland were sunk at 
the bottom of the sea ; that the Irish are a nation of 
irreclaimable savages and barbarians. How often 
have I heard these sentiments fall from the plump 
and thoughtless squire, and from the thriving English 
shopkeeper, who has never felt the rod of an Orange 
master upon his back. Ireland a millstone about your 
neck ! Why is it not a stone of Ajax in your hand ? 
I agree with you most cordially, that, governed as 
Ireland now is, it would be a vast accession of 
strength if the waves of the sea were to rise and in- 
gulf her to-morrow. At this moment, opposed as we 
are to all the world, the annihilation of one of the 
most fertile islands on the face of the globe, contain- 
ing five millions of human creatures, would be one of 
the most solid advantages which could happen to this 
country. I doubt very much, in spite of all the just 
abuse which has been lavished upon Bonaparte, 
whether there is any one of his conquered countries 
the blotting out of which would be as beneficial to him 
as the destruction of Ireland would be to us : of coun 
tries, I speak, differing in language from the French, 
little habituated to their intercourse, and inflamed 
with all the resentments of a recently conquered peo- 
ple. Why will you attribute the turbulence of our 
people to any cause but the right — to any cause but 
your own scandalous oppression? If you tie your 
horse up to a gate, and beat him cruelly, is he vicious 
because he kicks you? If you have plagued and 
worried a mastiff dog for years, is he mad because 
he flies at you whenever he sees you ? Hatred is an 
active, troublesome passion. Depend upon it, whole 
nations have always some reason for their hatred. 
Before you refer the turbulence of the Irish to incur- 
able defects in their character, tell me if you have 
treated them as friends and equals ? Have you pro- 
tected their commerce? Have you respected their 
religion ? Have you been as anxious for their freedom 
as your own ? Nothing of all this. What then ? — 
Why, you have confiscated the territorial surface of 
the country twice over ; you have massacred and ex- 
ported her inhabitants ; you have deprived four-fifths I 
of them of every civil privilege ; you have at every 
period made her commerce and manufactures slavishly 
subordinate to your own ; and yet the hatred which 
the Irish bear to you is the result of an original tur- 
bulence of character, and of a primitive, obdurate 
wildness, utterly incapable of civilization. The em. 
broidered inanities and the sixth-form effusions of Mr. 
Canning are really not powerful enough to make me 
believe this ; nor is there any authority on earth 
(always excepting the Dean of Christ-Church) which 
could make it credible to me. I am sick of Mr. Can- 
ning. There is not a ha'p'orth of bread to all this 
sugar and sack. I love not the cretaceous and incre- 
dible countenance of his colleague. The only opinion ; 
in which I agree with these two gentlemen, is that 
which they entertain of each other ; I am sure that I 
the insolence of Mr. Pitt, and the unbalanced accounts t 



PETER PLYMLEY'S LETTERS. 



338 



of Melville, were far better than the fine perils of this 
new ignorance : — 

Nonne fuit satius tristes Amaryllidis iras 
Atque superba pari fastidia — nonne Menalcam, 
Quamvis ille niger ? 
In the midst of the most profound peace, the secret 
articles of the treaty of Til9it, in which the destruc- 
tion of Ireland is resolved upon, induce you to rob the 
Danes of their fleet. — After the expedition sailed 
comes the treaty of Tilsit, containing no article,* pub- 
lic or private, alluding to Ireland. The state of the 
world, you tell me, justified us in doing this. — Just 
God ! do we only think of the state of the world when 
there is an opportunity for robbery, for murder, and for 
plunder ; and do we forget the state of the world when 
we are called upon to be wise, and good, and just? 
Does the state of the world never remind us, that we 
have four millions of subjects whose injuries we ought 
to atone for, and whose affections we ought to con- 
ciliate ? Does the state of the world never warn us to 
lay aside our infernal bigotry, and to arm every man 
who acknowledges a God and can grasp a sword? 
Did it ever occur to this administration, that they 
might virtuously get hold of a force ten times greater 
than the Danish fleet ? — Was there no other way of 
protecting Ireland, but by bringing eternal shame upon 
Great Britain, and by making the earth a den of rob- 
bers ? Sec what the men whom you have supplanted 
would have done. They would have rendered the 
invasion of Ireland impossible, by restoring to the 
Catholics their long-lost rights ; they would have 
acted in such a manner, that the French would neither 
have wished for invasion, nor dared to attempt it ; 
they would have increased the permanent strength of 
the country while they preserved its reputation unsul- 
lied. Nothing of this kind your friends have done, 
because they are solemnly pledged to do nothing of 
this kind ; because to tolerate all religions, and to 
equalize civil rights to all sects, is to oppose some of 
the worst passions of our nature — to plunder and to 
oppress is to gratify them all They wanted the huz- 
zas of mobs, and they have for ever blasted the fame 
of England to obtain them. Were the fleets of Hol- 
land, France, and Spain destroyed by larceny ? You 
resisted the power of 150 sail of the line by sheer 
courage, and violated every principle of morals from 
the dread of 15 hulks, while the expedition itself cost 
you three times more than the value of the larcenous 
matter brought away. The French trample upon the 
laws of God and man, not for old cordage, but for 
kingdoms, and always take care to be well paid for 
their crimes. We contrive, under the present admin- 
istration, to unite moral with intellectual deficiency, 
and to grow weaker and worse by the same action. 
If they had any evidence of the intended hostility of 
the Danes, why was it not produced? Why have the 
nations of Europe been allowed to feel an indignation 
against this country beyond the reach of all subse- 
quent information ? Are these times, do you imagine, 
when we can trifle with a year of universal hatred, 
dally with the curses of Europe, and then regain a 
lost character at pleasure, by the parliamentary per- 
spirations of the foreign secretary, or the solenm as- 
severations of the pecuniary Rose? Believe me, 
Abraham, it is not under such ministers as these that 
the dexterity of honest Englishmen will ever equal the 
dexterity of French knaves ; it is not in their presence 
that the serpent of Moses will ever swallow up the 
serpents of the magicians. 

Lord HawkesbiPry says, that nothing is to be grant- 
ed to the Catholics from fear. What ! not even jus- 
tice ? Why not ? There are four millions of disaf- 
fected people within twenty miles of your own coast. 
I fairly confess, that the dread which I have of their 
physical power, is with me a very strong motive for 
listening to their claims. To talk of not acting from 
fear is mere parliamentary cant. From what motive 
but fear, I should be glad to know, have all the im- 
provements in our constitution proceeded? I ques- 
tion if any justice has ever been done to large masses 

* This is now completely confessed to be the case by 



of mankind from any other motive. By what other 
motives can the plunderers of the Baltic suppose na- 
tions to be governed in their intercourse with each 
other ? If I say, give this people what they ask be- 
cause it is just, do you think I should get ten people 
to listen to me ? Would not the lesser of the two Jen- 
kinsons be the first to treat me with contempt? The 
only true way to make the mass of mankind see the 
beauty of justice, is by showing to them in pretty 
plain terms the consequences of injustice. If any bo- 
dy of French troops land in Ireland, the whole popula- 
tion of the country will rise against you to a man, and 
you could not possibly survive such an event three 
years. Such, from the bottom of my soul, do I believe 
to be the present state of that country ; and so far 
does it appear to me to be impolitic and unstatesman- 
like to concede any thing to such a danger, that if the 
Catholics, in addition to their present just demands, 
were to petition for the perpetual removal of the said 
Lord Hawkesbury from his majesty's councils, I 
think, whatever might be the effect upon the destinies 
of Europe, and however it might retard our own indi- 
vidual destruction, that the prayer of the petition 
should be instantly complied with. Canning's croco- 
dile tears should not move me ; the hoops of the maids 
of honour should not hide him. I would tear him 
from the banisters of the back stairs, and plunge him 
in the fishy fumes of the dirtiest of all his Cinque 
Ports. 



LETTER VII. 

Dear Abraham, 

In the correspondence which is passing between us, 
you are perpetually alluding to the foreign secretary ; 
and in answer to the dangers of Ireland, which I am 
pressing upon your notice, you have nothing to urge 
but the confidence which you repose in the discretion 
and sound sense of this gentleman.* I can only say, 
that I have listened to him long and often, with the 
greatest attention ; I have used every exertion in my 
power to take a fair measure of him, and it appears to 
me impossible to hear him upon any arduous topic 
without perceiving that he is eminently deficient in 
those solid and serious qualities upon which, and up- 
on which alone, the confidence of a great country can 
properly repose. He sweats, and labours, and works 
for sense, and Mr. Ellis seems always to think it is 
coming, but it does not come ; the machine can't draw 
up what is not to be found in the spring ; Providence 
has made him a light, jesting, paragraph- writing man, 
and that he will remain to his dying day. When he 
is jocular he is strong, when he is serious he is like 
Samson in a wig ; any ordinary person is a match for 
him ; a song, an ironical letter, a burlesque ode, an 
attack in the newspaper upon Nicoll's eye, a smart 
speech of twenty minutes, full of gross misrepresenta- 
tions and clever turns, excellent language, a spirited 
manner, lucky quotation, success in provoking dull 
men, some half information picked up in Pall Mall in 
the morning; these are your friend's natural wea- 
pons ; all these things he can do ; here I allow him to 
be truly great ; nay, I will be just, and go still far- 
ther, — if he would confine himself to these things, and 
consider the facete and the playful to be the basis of 
his character, he would, for that species of man, be 
universally regarded as a person of a very good under- 
standing ; call him a legislator, a reasoner, and the 
conductor of the affairs of a great nation, and it seems 
to me as absurd as if a butterfly were to teach bees to 
make honey. That he is an extraordinary writer of 
small poetry, and a diner out of the highest lustre, I 
do most readily admit. After George Selwyn, and 
perhaps Tickell, there has been no Ach man for this 
half century. The foreign secretary is a gentleman, a 

* The attack upon virtue and morals in the debate upon 
Copenhagen is brought forward with great ostentation by 
this gentleman's friends. But is Harlequin less Harlequin 
because he acts well? I was present: he leaped about, 
touched facts with his wand, turned yes into no, and no in- 
to yes; it was a pantomine well played, but a pantomine; 
Harlequin deserves higher wages than he did two yean 
ago ; is he therefore fit for serious parts ? 



324 



WORKS OF THE REV. SIDNEY SMITH. 



respectable as well as an highly agreeab.'te man in pri- 
vate life ; but you may as well feed me with decayed 
potatoes as console me for the miseries of Ireland Dy 
the resources of his sense and his discretion. It is 
only the public situation Avhich this gentleman holds 
which entitles me or induces me to say so much 
about him. He is a fly in amber ; nobody cares about 
the fly ; the only question is, How the devil did it get 
there ? Nor do I attack him from the love of glory, 
but from the love of utility, as a burgomaster hunts 
a rat in a Dutch dyke, for fear it should flood a pro- 
vince. 

The friends of the Catholic question are, I observe, 
extremely embarrassed in arguing when they come 
to the loyalty of the Irish Catholics. As for me, I 
shall go straight forward to my object, and state what 
I have no manner of doubt, from an intimate know- 
ledge of Ireland, to be the plain truth. Of the great 
Roman Catholic proprietors, and of the Catholic pre- 
lates, there may be a few, and but a few, who would 
follow the fortunes of England at all events ; there is 
another set of men who, thoroughly detesting this 
country, have too much property and too much char- 
acter to lose, not to wait for some very favourable 
e vent before they show themselves ; but the great 
mass of Catholic population, upon the slightest appear- 
ance of a French force in that country, would rise upon 
you to a man. It is the most mistaken policy to con-' 
ceal the plain truth. There is no loyalty among the 
Catholics ; they detest you as their worst oppressors, 
and they will continue to detest you till you remove 
the cause of their hatred. It is in your power in six 
months' time to produce a total revolution of opinions 
among this people ; and in some future letter I will 
show you that this is clearly the case. At present, 
see what a dreadful state Ireland is in. The common 
toast among the low Irish is, the feast of the passover. 
Some allusion to Bonaparte, in a play lately acted in 
Dublin, produced thunders of applause from the pit 
and the galleries ; and a politician should not be inat- 
tentive to the public feelings expressed in theatres. 
Mr. Perceval thinks he has disarmed the Irish ; he 
has no more disarmed the Irish than he has resigned 
a shilling of his own public emoluments. An Irish* 
peasant fills the barrel of his gun full of tow dipped 
in oil, butters up the lock, buries it in a bog, and al- 
lows the Orange bloodhound to ransack his cottage at 
pleasure. Be just and be kind to the Irish, and you will 
indeed disarm them ; rescue them from the degraded 
servitude in which they are held by an handful of their 
own countrymen, and you will add four millions of 
brave and affectionate men to your strength. Nightly 
'visits, Protestant inspectors, licenses to posses a pis- 
tol or a knife and fork, the odious vigour of the evan- 
gelical Perceval — acts of Parliament, drawn up by 
some English attorney, to save you from the hatred of 
four million people — the guarding yourselves from uni- 
versal disaffection by a police ; a confidence in the 
little cunning of Bow Street, when you might rest your 
security upon the eternal basis of the best feelings ; 
this is the meanness and madness to which nations 
are reduced when they lose sight of the first elements 
of justice, without which a country can be no more 
secure than it can be healthy without air. I sicken at 
such policy and such men. The fact is, the ministers 
know nothing about the present state of Ireland ; Mr. 
Perceval sees a few clergymen, Lord Castlereagh a 
few general officers, Avho take care, of course, to re- 
port what is pleasant rather than what is true. As 
for the joyous and lepid consul, he jokes upon neutral 
flags and feuds, jokes upon Irish rebels, jokes upon 
northern, and southern foes, and gives himself no 
trouble upon any subject ; nor is the mediocrity of the 
idolatrous deputy? of the slightest use. Dissolved in 
grins, he reads no memorials upon the state of Ireland, 
listens to no reports, asks no questions, and is the 

' Bourn from whom no traveller returns.' 

The danger of an immediate insurrection is now, I 

"* No man who is not intimately acquainted with the Irish, 
ean tell to what a curious extent this concealment of arms is 
carried. I have stated the exact mode in which it is done. 



believe,* blown over. You have so strong an army in 
Ireland, and the Irish are become so much more cun- 
ning from the last insurrection, that you may perhaps 
be tolerably secure from the efforts which the French 
may make to throw a body of troops into Ireland ? 
and do you consider that event to be difficult and im- 
probable? From Brest Harbour to Cape St. Vincent, 
you have above three thousand miles of hostile sea- 
coast, and twelve or fourteen harbours quite capable 
of containing a sufficient force for the powerful inva. 
sion of Ireland. The nearest of these harbours is not 
two days' saif from the southern coast of Ireland, 
with a fair leading wind ; and the farthest not ten. 
Five ships of the line, for so very short a passage, might 
carry five or six thousand troops with cannon and 
ammunition ; and Ireland presents to their attack a 
southern coast of more than 500 miles, abounding in 
deep bays, admirable harbours, and disaffected inhab- 
itants. Your blockading ships may be forced to come 
home for provisions and repairs, or they may be blown 
off in a gale of wind and compelled to bear away for 
their own coast ; — and j-ou will observe, that the very 
same wind which locks you up in the British Channel, 
when you are got there, is evidentty favourable for 
the invasion of Ireland. And yet this is called gov<- 
ernment, and the people huzza Mr. Perceval for con- 
tinuing to expose his country day after day to such 
tremendous perils as these'; cursing the men who 
would have given up a question in theology to have 
saved us from such a risk. The British Empire at 
this moment is in the state of a peach-blossom — if the 
wind blows gently from one quarter, it survives, if fu- 
riously from the other, it perishes. A stiff breeze 
may set in from the north, the Rochefort squadron 
will be taken, and the minister will be the most holy 
of men ; if it comes from some other point, Ireland is 
gone, we curse ourselves as a set of monastic mad- 
men, and call out for the unavailing satisfaction of 
Mr. Perceval's head. Such a state of political exis- 
tence is scarcely credible : it is the action of a mad 
young fool standing upon one foot, and peeping down 
the crater of Mount JEtna, not the conduct of a wise 
and sober people deciding upon their best and dearest 
interests : and in the name, the much injured name, of 
Heaven, what is it all for that we expose ourselves to 
these dangers ? Is it that we may sell moire muslin ? 
Is it that we may acquire more territory ? Is it that 
we may strengthen what we have already acquired ? 
No : nothing of all this ; but that one set of Irishmen 
may torture another set of Irishmen — that Sir Phelim 
O'Callagan may continue to whip Sir Toby M'Tackle, 
his next door neighbour, and continue to ravish his 
Catholic daughters ; and these are the measures which 
the honest and consistent secretary supports ; and this 
is the secretary whose genius in the estimation of 
Brother Abraham, is to extinguish the genuis of Bo- 
naparte. Pompey was killed by a slave, Goliath smit- 
ten by a stripling, Pyrrhus died by the hand of a wo- 
man ; tremble, thou great Gaul, from whose head an 
armed Minerva leaps forth in the hour of danger ; 
tremble, thou scourge of God, a pleasant man is come 
out against thee, and thou shalt be laid low by a joker 
of jokes, and he shall talk his pleasant talk against 
thee, and thou shalt be no more ! 

You tell me, in spite of all this parade of sea-coast, 
Bonaparte has neither ships nor sailors : but this is a 
mistake. He has not ships nor sailors to contest the 
empire of the seas with Great Britain, but there re- 
mains quite sufficient of the navies of France, Spain, 
Holland and Denmark, for these short excursions and 
invasions. Do you think, too, that Bonaparte does not 
add to this navy every year ? Do you suppose, with 
all Europe at his feet, that he can find any difficulty 
in obtaining timber, and that money will not procure 
for him any quantity of naval stores he may want? 
The mere machine, the empty ship, he can build as 
well, and as quickly, as you can ; and though he may 
not find enough of practised sailors to man large fight- 
ing fleets — it is not possible to conceive that he can 
want sailors for such purposes as I have stated. He 

* I know too much, however, of the state of Ireland not 
to speak tremblingly about this. I hope to God I am right. 



PETER PLYMLEY'L LETTERS. 



32& 



Is at present the despotic monarch of above twenty 
•housand miles of sea-coast, and yet you suppose he 
cannot procure sailors for the invasion of Ireland. 
Believe, if you please, that such a fleet met at sea by 
any number of our ships at all comparable to them in 
point of force, would be immediately taken ; let it be 
so ; I count nothing- upon their power of resistance, 
only upon their power of escaping unobserved. If 
experience has taught us anything, it is the impossi- 
bility of perpetual blockades. The instances are innu- 
merable, during the course of this war, where whole 
fleets have sailed in and out of harbour in spite of 
every vigilance used to prevent it. I shall only men- 
tion those cases where Ireland is concerned. In 
December, 1796, seven ships of the line and ten trans- 
ports reached Bantry Bay from Brest, without having 
seen an English ship in their passage. It blew a storm 
when they were oil" shore, and therefore England still 
continues to be an independent kingdom. You will 
observe that at the very time the French fleet sailed 
out of Brest harbour. Admiral Colpoys was cruising 
off there with a powerful squadron, and still, from the 
particular circumstance of the weather, found it im- 
possible to prevent the French from coming out. 
During the time that Admiral Colpoys was cruising off 
Brest, Admiral Richery, with six ships of the line, 
passed him, and got safe into the harbour At the 
very moment when the French squadron was lying in 
Bantry Bay, Lord Bridport with his fleet was locked 
up by a foul wind hi the Channel, and for several days 
could not stir to the assistance of Ireland. Admiral 
Colpoys, totally unable to find the French fleet, came 
home. Lord Bridport, at the change of the wind, 
cruised for them in vain, and they got safe back to 
Brest, without having seen a single one of these float- 
ing bulwarks, the possession of which we believe will 
enable us with impunity to set justice and common 
sense at defiance. Such is the miserable and precari- 
ous state of an anemocracy. of a people who put their 
trust in hurricanes, and are governed by wind. In 
August, 1798, three forty-gun frigates landed 1,100 
men under Humbert, making the passage from Ro- 
chelle to Killala, without seeing any English ship. 
In October of the same year, four French frigates an- 
chored in Killala Bay with 2,000 troops; and though 
they did not land their troops, they returned to France 
in safety. In the same month a line of battle ship, 
eight stout frigates, and a brig, all full of troops and 
stores, reached the coast of Ireland, and were fortu- 
nately, in sight of land, destroyed, after an obstinate 
engagement, by Sir John Warren. 

If you despise the little troop which, in these nume- 
rous experiments, did make good its landing, take with 
you, if you please, this precis of its exploits : eleven 
hundred men, commanded by a soldier raised from the 
ranks, put to route a select army of 6,000 men, com- 
manded by General Lake, seized their ordnance, am- 
munition, and stores, advanced 150 miles into a coun- 
try containing an armed force of 150,000 men, and at 
last surrendered to the viceroy, an experienced gene- 
ral, gravely and cautiously advancing at the head of 
all his chivalry and of an immense army to oppose 
him. You must excuse these details about Ireland, 
but it appears to me to be of all other subjects the 
most important. If we conciliate Ireland, we can do 
nothing amiss ; if we do not, we can do nothing well. 
If Ireland was friendly, we might equally set at defi- 
ance the talents of Bonaparte and the blunders of his 
rival, Mr. Canning ; we could then support the ruinous 
and silly bustle of our useless expeditions, and the 
almost incredible ignorance of our commercial orders 
in council. Let the present administration give up but 
this one point, and there is nothing which I would not 
consent to grant them. Mr. Perceval shall have full 
liberty to insult the tomb of Mr. Fox, and to torment 
every eminent dissenter in Great Britain ; Lord Cam- 
den shall have large boxes of plums ; Mr. Rose re- 
ceive permission to prefix to his name the appellative 
of virtuous ; and to the Viscount Castlereagh* a round 
sum of ready money shall be well and truly paid into 
his hands. Lastly, what remains to Mr. George Can- 

* This is a very unjust imputation on Lord Castlereagh, 



ning, but that he rides up and down Pall Mall glorious 
upon a white horse, and that they cry out before him, 
' Thus shall it be done to the statesman who has writ- 
ten ' The Needy Knife-Grinder,' and the German play ? 
Adieu only for the present •, you shall soon hear from 
me again ; it is a subject upon which I cannot long be 
silent. 



LETTER VIII. 

Nothing can be more erroneous than to suppose that 
Ireland is no bigger than the Isle of Wight, or of more 
consequence than Guernsey or Jersey ; and yet I am 
almost inclined to believe, from the general supineness 
which prevails here respecting the dangerous state of 
that country, that such is the rank which it holds 
in our statistical tables. I have been writing to you a 
great deal about Ireland, and perhaps it may be of 
some use to state to you concisely the nature and re- 
sources of the country which has been the subject of 
our long and strange correspondence. There were 
returned, as I have before observed, to the hearth tax, 
in 1791, 701 , 132* houses, which Mr. Newenham shows 
from unquestionable documents to be nearly 80,000 
below the real number of houses in that country. 
There are 27,457 square miles in Ireland,f and more 
than five millions of people. 

By the last survey, it appears that the inhabited 
houses in England and Wales amounted to 1,574,902, 
and the population to 9,343,578, which gives an average 
oi*5£ to each house, in a country where the density of 
population is certainly less considerable than in Ire- 
land. It is commonly supposed that two-fifths of the 
army and navy are Irishmen, at periods when politi- 
cal disaffection does not avert the Catholics from the 
service. The current value of Irish exports in 1807 
was 9,314,S54Z. 175. Id. ; a state of commerce about 
equal to the commerce of England in the middle of 
the reign of George II. The tonnage of ships entered 
inward and cleared outward in the trade of Ireland, in 
1S07, amounted to 1,567,430 tons. The quantity of 
home spirits exported amounted to 10,284 gallons in 
1796, and to 930,800 gallons in 1804. Of the exports, 
which I have stated, provisions amounted to four mil- 
lions, and linen to about four millions and a half. 
There was exported from Ireland, upon an average of 
two years ending in January, 1804, 591 ,274 barrels of 
barley, oats and wheat ; and by weight 910,848 cwts. 
of flour, oatmeal, barley, oats and wheat. The amount 
of butter exported in 1804, from Ireland, was worth, 
in money, 1 ,704,680?. sterling. The importation of 
ale and beer from the immense manufactures now 
carrying on of these articles, was diminished to 3209 
barrels, in the year 1804, from Hl-,920 barrels, which 
was the average importation per annum, taking from 
three years ending in 1792 ; and at present there is an 
export trade of porter. On an average of the three 
years, ending March, 1783, there were imported into 
Ireland, of cotton wool, 3326 cwts. of cotton yarn, 
5405 lbs. ; but on an average of three years, ending 
January, 1803, there were imported, of the first article, 
13,159 cwts., and of the latter, 628,406 lbs. It is im- 
possible to conceive any manufacture more flourish- 
ing. The export of linen has increased in Ireland from 
17,776,862 yards, the average in 1770, to 43,534,971 
yards, the amount in 1805. The tillage of Ireland has 
more than trebled within the last twenty-one )'ears. 
The importation of coals has increased from 230,000 
tons in 1783, to 417,030 in 1804; of tobacco, from 
3,459,861 lbs. in 17S3, to 6,611.543 in 1S04; of tea, 
from 1,703,855 lbs. in 1783, to 3,358,256, in 1S04 ; of 
sugar, from 143,117 cwts. in 1782, to 309,076, in 1804. 
Ireland new supports a funded debt of above 64 mil- 
lions, and it is computed that more than three millions 
of money are annually remitted to Irish absentees resi- 



i * The checks to population were very trifling from the 
rebellion. It lasted two months : of his majesty's Irish forces ^ 
there perished about 1,600; of the rebels, 11,000 were killed in 
the field, and 2,000 hanged or exported 400 loyal persons 
were assassinated, 
t In England 49,45* 



326 



WORKS OF THE REV. SIDNEY SMITH. 



dent in this country. In Mr. Foster's report, of 100 
folio pages, presented to the House of Commons in 
the year 1806, the total expenditure of Ireland is 
stated at 9,760,013/. Ireland has increased about two- 
thirds in its population within twenty-five years, and 
yet, and in about ihe same space of time, its exports 
of beef, bullocks, cows, pork, swine, butter, wheat, 
barley, and oats, collectively taken, have doubled; 
and this in spite of two years' famine, and the pre- 
sence of an immense army, that is always at hand to 
guard the most valuable appanage of our empire from 
joining our most inveterate enemies. Ireland has the 
greatest possible facilities for carrying on commerce 
with the whole of Europe. It contains, within a cir- 
cuit of 750 miles, 66 secure harbours, and presents a 
western frontier against Great Britain, reaching from 
the Firth of Clyde north to the Bristol' Channel south, 
and varying in distance from 20 to 100 miles ; so that 
the subjugation of Ireland would compel us to guard 
with ships and soldiers a new line of coast, certainly 
amounting, with all its sinuosities, to more than 700 
miles — an addition of polemics, in our present state of 
hostility with all the world, which must highly gratify 
the vigorists, and give them an ample opportunity of 
displaying that foolish energy upon which their claims 
to distinction are founded. Such is the country which 
the right reverend the chancellor of the exchequer 
would drive into the arms of France, and for the con- 
ciliation of which we are requested to wait, as if it 
were one of those sinecure places which were given to 
Mr. Perceval snarling at the breast, and which cannot 
be abolished till his decease. 

How sincerely and fervently have I often wished 
that the Emperor of the French had thought as Mr. 
Spencer Perceval does upon the subject of govern- 
ment ; that he had entertained doubts and scruples 
upon the propriety of admitting the Protestants to an 
equality of rights with the Catholics, and that he had 
left in the middle of his empire these vigorous seeds 
of hatred and disaffection : but the world was never 
yet conquered by a blockhead. One of the very first 
measures we saw him recurring to was the complete 
establishment of religious liberty ; if his subjects 
fought and paid as he pleased, he allowed them to be- 
lieve as they pleased ; the moment I saw this, my best 
hopes were lost. I perceived in a moment the kind of 
man we had to do with. I was well aware of the 
miserable ignorance and folly of this country upon the 
subject of toleration ; and every year has been adding 
success of that game which it was clear he had 
will and the ability to play against us. 

You say Bonaparte is not in earnest upon the sub- 
ject of religion, and that this is the cause of his tole- 
rant spirit : but is it possible you can intend to give 
us such dreadful and unamiable notions of religion? — 
Are we to understand that the moment a man is sin- 
cere he is narrow-minded ; that persecution is the child 
of belief ; and that a desire to leave all men in the quiet 
and unpunished exercise of their own creed can only 
exist in the mind of an infidel ? Thank God ! I know 
many men whose principles are as firm as they are ex- 
panded, who cling tenaciously to their own modifica- 
tion of the Christian faith, without the slightest dispo- 
s 'on to force that modification upon other people. — 
If Bonaparte is liberal in subjects of religion because 
he has no religion, is this a reason why we should be 
illiberal because we are Christians? If he owes this 
excellent quality to a vice, is that any reason why we 
may not owe it to a virtue ? Toleration is a great 
good, and a good to be imitated, let it come from 
whom it will. If a sceptic is tolerant, it only shows 
that he is not foolish in practice as well as erroneous 
in theory. If a religious man is tolerant, it evinces 
that he is religious from thought and inquiry, because 
he exhibits in his conduct one of the most beautiful 
and important consequences of a religious mind, — an 
inviolable charity to all the honest varieties of human 
opinion. 

Lord Sidmouth, and all the anti-Catholic people, lit- 
• tie foresee that they will hereafter be the sport of the 
antiquarian ; that their prophecies of ruin and destruc- 
tion from Catholic emancipation will be clapped into 
the notes of some quaint history, and be matter of 



pleasantry even to the sedulous housewife and the ru- 
ral dean. There is always a copious supply of Lord 
Sidmouths in the world ; nor is there one single 
source of human happiness against which they have 
not uttered the most lugubrious predictions. Turnpike 
roads, navigable canals, inocidation, hops, tobacco 
the Reformation, the Revolution — there are always a 
set of worthy and moderately gifted men, who bawl 
out death and ruin upon every valuable change which 
the varying aspect of human affairs absolutely and im- 
periously requires. I have often thought that it would 
be extremely useful to make a collection of the ha- 
tred and abuse that all those changes have experi- 
enced, which are now admitted to be marked improve- 
ments in our condition. Such an history might make 
folly a little more modest, and suspicious of its own 
decisions. 

Ireland, you say, since the union, is to be considered 
as a part of the whole kingdom ; and therefore, how- 
ever Catholics may predominate in that particular 
spot, yet, taking the whole empire together, they are 
to be considered as a much more insignificant quota of 
the population. Consider them in what fight you 
please, as part of the whole, or by themselves, or in 
what manner may be most consentaneous to the devi- 
ces of your holy mind — I say in a very few words, if 
you do not relieve these people from the civil incapaci- 
ties to which they are exposed, you will lose them; or 
you must employ great strength and much treasure in 
watching over them. In the present state of the world, 
you can afford to do neither the one nor the other. 
Having stated this, I shall leave you to be ruined, Puff- 
endorf in hand, (as Mr. Secretary Canning says,) and 
to lose Ireland, just as you have found out what pro- 
portion the aggrieved people should bear to the whole 
population, before their calamities meet with redress. 
As for your parallel cases, I am no more afraid of de- 
ciding upon them than I am upon their prototype. If 
ever any one heresy should so far spread itself over 
the principality of Wales that the established church 
were left in a minority of one to four ; if you had sub- 
jected these heretics to very severe civil priva- 
tions ; if the consequence of such privations were 
an universal state of disaffection among that caseous 
and wrathful people ; and if, at the same time, you 
were at war with all the world, how can you doubt for 
a moment that I would instantly restore them to a 
state of the most complete civil liberty 2 What mat- 
ters it under what name you put the same case ? Com- 
mon sense is not changed by appellations. I have said 
how I would act to Ireland, and I would act so to all 
the world. 

I admit that, to a certain degree, the government 
will lose the affections of the Orangemen "by emanci- 
pating the Catholics ; much less, however, at present 
than three years past. The few people, who have ill- 
treated the whole crew, live in constant terror that the 
oppressed people will rise upon them and carry the 
ship into Brest : — they begin to find that it is a very 
tiresome thing to sleep every night with cocked pistols 
under their pillows, and to breakfast, dine, and sup 
with drawn hangers. They suspect that the privilege 
of beating and kicking the rest of the sailors is hard 
ly worth all this anxiety, and that if the ship does ever 
fall into the hands of the disaffected, all the cruelties 
which they have experienced will be thoroughly re- 
membered and amply repaid. To a short period of 
disaffection among the Orangemen, I confess I should 
not much object : my love of poetical justice does 
carry me as far as that : one summer's whipping, only 
one ; the thumb-screw for a short season ; a little 
light easy torturing between Lady-day and Michael- 
mas ; a short specimen of Mr. Perceval's rigour. I 
have malice enough to ask this slight atonement for 
the groans and shrieks of the poor Catholics, unheard 
by any human tribunal, but registered by the angel of 
God against their Protestant and enlightened oppres- 
sors. 

Besides, if you who count ten so often can count five, 
you must perceive that it is better to have four friends 
and one enemy than four enemies and one friend ; and 
the more violent the hatred of the Orangemen, the 
more certain the reconciliation of the Catholics. The 



PETER PLYMLEY'S LETTERS. 



327 



disaffection of the Orangemen will be the Irish rain- 
bow ; when I see it, I shall be sure that the storm is 
over. 

If those incapacities, from which the Catholics ask 
to be relieved, were to the mass of them only a mere 
feeling of pride, and if the question were respecting 
the attainment of privileges which could be of impor- 
tance only to the highest of the sect, I should still say, 
that the pride of the mass was very naturally wounded 
by the degradation of their superiors. Indignity to 
George Rose would be felt by the smallest nummary 
gentleman in the king's employ ; and Mr. John Ban- 
nister could not be indifferent to any thing which hap- 
pened to Mr. Canning. But the truth is, it is a most 
egregious mistake to suppose that the Caiholics are 
contending merely for the fringes and feathers of their 
chiefs. I will give you a list, in my next letter, of 
those privations which are represented to be of no con- 
sequence to any body but Lord Fingal, and some 
twenty or thirty of the principal persons of their sect. 
In the mean time, adieu, and be wise. 



LETTER IX. 

Dear Abraham, 

No Catholic can be chief governor or governor of 
this kingdom, chancellor or keeper of the great seal, 
lord high-treasurer, chief of any of the courts of jus- 
tice, chancellor of the exchequer, puisne judge, judge 
in the admiralty, master of the rolls, secretary of 
state, keeper of the privy seal, vice-treasurer or his 
deputy, teller or cashier of exchequer, auditor or 
general, governor or custos rotulorum of counties, 
chief governor's secretary, privy councillor, king's 
counsel, serjeant, attorney, solicitor-general, master in 
chancery, provost or fellow of Trinity College, Dublin, 
postmaster-general, master and lieutenant-general of 
ordnance, commander-in-chief, general on the staff, 
sheriff, sub-sheriff, mayor, bailiff, recorder, burgess, 
or any other officer in a city, or a corporation. No 
Catholic can be guardian to a Protestant, and no priest 
guardian at all ; no Catholic can be a gamekeeper, or 
have for sale, or otherwise, any arms or warlike 
stores ; no Catholic can present to a living, unless he 
chooses to turn Jew in order to obtain that privilege ; 
the pecuniary qualification of Catholic jurors is made 
higher than that of Protestants, and no relaxation of 
the ancient rigorous code is permitted, unless to those 
who shall take an oath prescribed by 13 & 14 Geo. III. 
Now if this is not picking the plums out of the pudding, 
and leaving the mere batter to the Catholics, I know 
not what it is. If it were merely the privy council, it 
would be (I allow) nothing but a point of honour for 
which the mass of Catholics were contending, the 
honour of being chief mourners or pall-bearers to the 
country ; but surely no man will contend that every 
barrister may speculate upon the possibility of being 
a puisne judge ; and that every shopkeeper must not 
feel himself injured by his exclusion from borough 
offices. 

One of the greatest practical evils which the Catho- 
lics suffer in Ireland, is their exclusion from the offi- 
ces of sheriff and deputy sheriff. Nobody who is un- 
acquainted with Ireland, can conceive the obstacles 
which this opposes to the fair administration of jus- 
tice. The formation of juries is now entirely in the 
hands of the Protestants; the lives, liberties, and pro- 
perties of the Catholics in the hands of the juries ; 
and this is the arrangement for the administration of 
justice in a country where religious prejudices are in- 
flamed to the greatest degree of animosity ! In this 
«ountiy. if a man is a foreigner, if he sells slippers, 
and sealing wax and artificial flowers, we are tender 
of human fife, that we take care half the number of 
persons who are to decide upon his fate should be 
men of similar prejudices and feelings with himself: 
but a poor Catholic in Ireland may be tried by twelve 
Percevals, and destroyed according to the manner of 
that gentleman in the name of the Lord, and with all 
the insulting forms of justice. I do not go the length 
of saying that deliberate and wilful injustice is done. 



I have no doubt that the Orange deputy-sheriff thinks 
it would be a most unpardonable breach of his duty if 
he did not summon a Protestant panel. I can easily 
believe that the Protestant panel may conduct them- 
selves very conscientiously in hanging the gentleman 
of the crucifix ; but I blame the law which does not 
guard the Catholic against the probable tenour of 
those feelings which must unconsciously influence the 
judgments of mankind. I detest that state of society 
which extends unequal degrees of protection to differ- 
ent creeds and persuasions ; and I cannot describe to 
you the contempt I feel for a man who, calling him- 
self a statesman, defends a system which fills the 
heart of every Irishman with treason, and makes his 
allegiance prudence, not choice. 

I request to know if the vestry taxes, in Ireland, are 
a mere matter of romantic feeling, which can affect 
only the Earl of Fingal ? In a parish where there 
are four thousand Catholics and fifty Protestants, the 
Protestants may meet together in a vestry meeting, at 
which no Catholic has the right to vote, and tax all 
the lands in the parish 1*. 6d. per acre, or in the pound, 
I forget which, for the repairs of the church — and how 
has the necessity of these repairs been ascertained ? 
A Protestant plumber has discovered that it wants 
new leading ; a Protestant carpenter is convinced the 
timbers are not sound, and a glazier, who hates holy 
water, (as an accoucheur hates celibacy because he 
gets nothing by it,) is employed to put in new sashes. 

The grand juries in Ireland are the great scene of 
jobbing. They have a power of making a county rate 
to a considerable extent for roads, bridges, and other 
objects of general accommodation. ' You suffer the 
road to be brought through my park, and I will have 
the bridge constructed in a situation where it will 
make a beautiful object to your house. You do my 
job, and I will do yours.' These are the sweet and 
interesting subjects which occasionally occupy Mile- 
sian gentlemen while they are attendant upon this 
grand inquest of justice. But there is a religion, it 
seems, even in jobs ; and it will be highly gratifying 
to Mr. Perceval to learn that no man in Ireland who be- 
lieves in seven sacraments can carry a public road, or 
bridge, one yard out of the direction most beneficial to 
the public, and that nobody can cheat that public who 
does not expound the Scriptures in the purest and 
most orthodox manner. This will give pleasure to 
Mr. Perceval : but. from his unfairness upon these to- 
pics, I appeal to the justice and proper feelings of Mr. 
Huskisson. I ask him it the human mind can experi- 
ence a more dreadful sensation than to see its own 
jobs refused, and the jobs of another religion perpetu- 
ally succeeding ? I ask him his opinion of a jobless 
faith, of a creed which dooms a man through life to a 
lean and plunderless integrity. He knows that human 
nature cannot and will not bear it ; and if we were to 
paint a political Tartarus, it would be an endless 
series of snug expectations and cruel disappointments. 
These are a few of many dreadful inconveniences 
wmich the Catholics of all ranks suffer from the laws 
by which they are at present oppressed. Besides, look 
at human nature : — what is the history of all profes- 
sions ? Joel is to be brought up to the bar : has Mrs. 
Plymley the slightest doubt of his being chancellor ? 
Do not his two shrivelled aunts live in the certainty of 
seeing him in that situation, and of cutting out with 
their OAvn hands his equity habiliments ? And I could 
name a certain minister of the Gospel who does not, 
in the bottom of his hear,t, much differ from these 
opinions. Do you think that the lathers and mothers 
of the holy Catholic Church are not as absurd as Pro- 
testant papas and mammas ? The probability I ad- 
mit to be, in each particular case, that the sweet little 
blockhead will in fact never get a brief; — but I will 
venture to say. there is not a parent from the Giant's 
Causeway to 'Bantry Bay who does not conceive that 
his child is the unfortunate victim of the exclusion, 
and that nothing short of positive law could prevent 
his own dear pre-eminent Paddy from rising to the 
highest honours of the state. So with the army, and 
Parliament; in fact, few are excluded; but, in imagi- 
nation, all : you keep twenty or thirty Catholics out, 
and you lose the affections of four millions ; and, let 



328 



WOR£S OF THE REV. SIDNEY SMITH. 



me tell you, that recent circumstances have by 310 
means tended to diminish in the minds of men that 
hope of elevation beyond their own rank which is so 
congenial to our nature ; from pleading for John Roe 
to taxing John Bull, from jesting for Mr. Pitt and 
writing in the Anti-Jacobin, to managing the affairs 
of Europe — these are leaps which seem to justify the 
fondest dreams of mothers and of aunts. 

I do not say that the disabilities to which the Ca- 
tholics are exposed, amount to such intolerable grie- 
vances, that the strength and industry of a nation are 
overwhelmed by them : the increasing prosperity of 
Ireland fully demonstrates the contrary But I repeat 
again, what I have often stated in the course of our 
correspondence, that your laws against the Catholics 
are exactly in that state in which you have neither 
the benefits of rigour nor of liberality ; every law 
which prevented the Catholics from gaining strength 
and wealth is repealed ; every law which can irritate 
remains : if you were determined to insult the Catho- 
lics, you should have kept them weak ; if you resolved 
to give them strength, you should have ceased to in- 
sult them : at present your conduct is pure unadulte- 
rated folly. 

Lord Hawkesbury says, we heard nothing about the 
Catholics till we began to mitigate the laws against 
them ; when we relieved them in part from this op- 
pression they began to be disaffected. This is very 
true ; but it proves just what I have said, that you 
have either done too much, or too little ; and as there 
lives not, I hope, upon earth, so depraved a courtier 
that he would load the Catholics with their ancient 
chains, what absurdity it is then not to render their 
dispositions friendly, when you leave their arms and 
legs free ! 

You know, and many Englishmen know, what pass- 
es in China; but nobody knows or cares what passes 
in Ireland. At the beginning of the present reign, no 
Catholic could realize property, or carry on any busi- 
ness ; they were absolutely annihilated, and had no 
more agency in the country than so many trees. They 
were like Lord Mulgrave's eloquence, and Lord Cam- 
den's wit ; the legislative bodies did not know of their 
existence. For these twenty-five years last past, the 
Catholics have been engaged in commerce ; within 
that period the commerce of Ireland has doubled : 
there are four Catholics at work for one Protestant, and 
eight Catholics at work for one Episcopalian ; of 
course, the proportion which Catholic wealth bears to 
Protestant wealth is every year altering rapidly in fa. 
vour of the Catholics. I have already told you what their 
purchases of land were the last year ; since that period 
I have been at some pains to find out the actual state 
of the Catholic wealth ; it is impossible, upon such a 
subject, to arrive at complete accuracy; but I have 
good reason to believe that there are at present two 
thousand Catholics in Ireland, possessing an income 
from 500Z. upwards, many of these with incomes of 
one, two, three, and four thousand, and some amount- 
ing to fifteen and twenty thousand per annum : and 
this is the kingdom, and these the people, for whose 
conciliation we are to wait heaven knows when, and 
Lord Hawkesbury why ! As for me, I never think of 
the situation of Ireland, without feeling the same ne- 
cessity for immediate interference as I should do if I 
saw blood flowing from a great artery. I rush towards 
it with the instinctive rapidity of a man desirous of 
preventing death, and have no other feeling but that 
in a few seconds the patient may be no more. 

I could not help smiling in the times of no-popery, 
to witness the loyal indignation of many persons at 
the attempt made by the last ministry to do something 
for the relief of Ireland. The general cry in the coun- 
try was, that they would not see their beloved mo- 
narch used ill in his old age, and that they would 
stand by him to the last drop of their blood. I respect 
good feelings, however erroneous be the occasions on 
which they display themselves ; and, therefore, I saw 
in all this as much to admire as to blame. It was a 
species of affection, however, which reminded me very 
forcibly of the attachment displayed by the servants 
of the Russian ambassador, at the beginning of the 
last century. His excellency happened to fall down 



in a kind of apoplectic fit, when he was paying a 
morning visit in the house of an acquaintance. The 
confusion was, of course, very great, and messengers 
were despatched, in every direction, to find a surgeon 
who, upon his arrival, declared that his excellency 
must be immediately blooded, and prepared himself 
forthwith to perform the operation; the barbarous 
servants of the embassy, who were there in great 
numbers, no sooner saw the surgeon prepared to 
wound the arm of their master with a sharp shining 
instrument, than they drew their swords, put them- 
selves hi an attitude of defence, and swore in pure 
Sclavonic, f that they would murder any man who at- 
tempted to do hiin the slightest injury ; he had been 
a very good master to them, and they would not desert 
him in his misfortunes, or suffer his blood to be shed 
while he was off his guard, and incapable of defending 
himself.' By good fortune, the secretary arrived about 
this period of the dispute, and his excellency, relieved 
from superfluous blood and perilous affection, was, 
after much difficulty, restored to life. 

There is an argument brought forward with some 
appearance of plausibility in the House of Commons, 
which certainly merits an answer. You know that 
the Catholics now vote for members of Parliament in 
Ireland, and that they outnumber the Protestants in a 
very great proportion ; if you allow Catholics to sit in 
Parliament, religion will be found to influence votes 
more than property, the greater part of the hundred 
Irish members who are returned to Parliament will be 
Catholics. Add to these the Catholic members who 
are returned in England, and you will have a phalanx 
of heretical strength which every minister will be 
compelled to respect, and occasionally to conciliate 
by concessions incompatible with the mterests of the 
Protestant Church. The fact is, however, that you 
are, at this moment subjected to every danger of this 
kind, which you can possibly apprehend hereafter. If 
the spiritual interests of the voters are more powerful 
than their temporal interests, they can bind down their 
representatives to support any measures favourable to 
the Catholic religion, and they can change the objects 
of their choice till they have found Protestant mem- 
bers (as they easily may do) perfectly obedient to 
their wishes. If the superior possessions of the Pro- 
testants prevent the Catholics from uniting for a com- 
mon political object, then the danger you fear cannot, 
exist ; if zeal, on the contrary, gets the better of acres, 
than the danger at present exists, from the right of 
voting already given to the Catholics, and it will not 
be increased by allowing them to sit in Parliament. 
There are, as nearly as I can recollect, thirty seats in 
Ireland for cities and counties, where the Protestants 
are the most numerous, and where the members re- 
turned must of course be Protestants. In the other 
seventy representations, the wealth of the Protestant 
is opposed to the number of the Catholics ; and if all 
the seventy members returned were of the Catholic 
persuasion, they must still plot the destruction of our 
religion in the midst of 58S Protestants. Such terrors 
would disgrace a cook-maid, or a toothless aunt — 
when they fall from the lips of bearded and senatorial 
men, they are nauseous, antiperistaltic, and emetical. 

How can you for a moment doubt of the rapid ef- * 
fects which would be produced by the emancipation? 
In the first place, to my certain knowledge, the Catho- 
lics have long since expressed to his majesty's minis- 
ters their perfect readiness to vest in his majesty, either 
with the consent df the pope, or without it, if it cannot 
be obtained, the nomination of the Catholic prelacy. 
The Catholic prelacy in Ireland consis of twenty-six 
bishops, and the warden of Galway, a dignitary en- 
joying Catholic jurisdiction. The number of Roman 
Catholic priests in Ireland exceeds one thousand. The 
expenses of his peculiar worship are, to a substantial 
farmer or mechanic, five shillings per annum ; to a la- 
bourer (where he is not entirely excused) one shilling 
per annum ; this includes the contribution of the whole 
family, and for this the priest is bound to attend them 
when sick, and to confess them when they apply to 
him ; he is also to keep his chapel in order, to cele- 
brate divine service, and to preach on Sundays and 
holydays. In the northern district a priest gams from 



PETER PLYMLEY'S LETTERS. 



, 30/. to 501. ; in the other parts of Ireland from 60/. to 
901. per annum. The best paid Catholic bishops receive 
about 400/. per annum; the others from 300'!. to 350/. 
My plan is very simple ; I would have 300 Catholic 
parishes at 100/. per ann., 300 at 200/. per ann., and 
400 at 300/. per ann. ; this, for the whole thousand 
parishes, would amount to 190,000/. To the prelacy 
I would allot 20,000/. in unequal proportions, from 
1000/. to 500/. ; and I would appropriate 40,000/. more 
for the support of Catholic schools, and the repairs of 
Catholic churches ; the whole amount of which sums 
is 250,000/., about the expense of three days of one of 
our genuine, good, English, just and necessary wars. 
The clergy should all receive their salaries at the Bank 
of Ireland, and I would place the whole patronage in 
the hands of the crown. Now, I appeal to any human 
being, except Spencer Perceval, Esq., of the parish of 
Hampstead, what the disaffection of a clergy would 
amount to, gaping after this graduated bounty of the 
crown, and whether Ignatius Loyola himself, if he 
were a living blockhead instead of a dead saint, could 
withstand the temptation of bouncing from 100/. a 
year in Sligo, to 300/. in Tipperary ? This is the mis- 
erable sum of money for which the merchants, and 
land-owners, and nobility of England are exposing 
themselves to the tremendous peril of losing Ireland. 
The sinecure places of the Roses and the Percevals, 
and the • dear and near relations,' put up to auction at 
thirty years' purchase, would almost amount to the 
money. 

I admit that nothing can be more reasonable than 
to expect that a Catholic priest should starve to death, 
genteelly and pleasantly, for the good of the Protestant 
religion ; but is it equally reasonable to expect that he 
should do so for the Protestant pews, and Protestant 
brick and mortar ? On an Irish Sabbath, the bell of a 
neat parish church often summons to church only the 
parson and an occasionally conforming clerk ; while, 
two hundred yards off, a thousand Catholics are hud- 
dled together in a miserable hovel, and pelted by all the 
storms of heaven. Can any thing be more distressing 
than to see a venerable man pouring forth sublime 
truths in tattered breeches, and depending for his food 
upon the little offal he gets from his parishioners ? I 
venerate a human being who starves for his principles, 
let them be what they may ; but starving for any thing 
is not at all to the taste of the honourable flagellants ; 
strict principles, and good pay, is the motto of Mr. 
Perceval ; the one he keeps in great measure for the 
faults of his enemies, the other for himself. 

There are parishes in Connaught in which a Protes- 
tant was never settled, nor even seen ; in that pro- 
vince, in Munster, and in parts of Leinster, the entire 
peasantry for sixty miles are Catholics; in these 
tracts, the churches are frequently shut for want of 
a congregation, or opened to an assemblage of from six 
to twenty persons. Of what Protestants there are in 
Ireland, the greatest part are gathered together in 
Ulster, or they live in towns. In the country of the 
other three provinces the Catholics see no other re- 
ligion but their own, and are at the least as fifteen 
to one Protestant. In the diocese of Tuam, they 
are sixty to one; in the parish of St. Mullins, dio- 
cese of Leghlin, there are four thousand Catholics 
and one Protestant ; in the town of Grasgenamana, 
in the county of Kilkenny, there are between four 
and five hundred Catholic houses, and three Protes- 
tant houses. In the parish of Allen, county Kildare, 
there is no Protestant, though it is very populous. In 
the parish of Arslein, Queen's county, the proportion 
is one hundred to one. In the whole county of Kilken- 
ny, by actual enumeration, it is seventeen to one ; in 
the diocese of Kilmacduagh, province of Connaught, fif- 
ty-two to one, by ditto. These I give you as a few 
specimens of the present state of Ireland ; — and yet 
there are men imprudent and ignorant enough to con- 
tend that such evils require no remedy, and that mild 
family man who dwelleth in Hampstead, can find none 
but the cautery and the knife, 



omne per ignem 

Excoquitur vitiura. 
I cannot describe the horror and disgust which I 



felt at hearing Mr. Perceval call on the then ministry 
for measures of vigour in Ireland. If I lived at Hamp- 
stead upon stewed meats and claret ; if I walked to 
church every Sunday before eleven young gentlemen 
of my own begetting, with their faces washed, and 
their hair pleasingly combed; if the Almighty had 
blessed me with every earthly comfort, — how awfully 
would I pause before' I sent forth the flame and the 
sword over the cabins of the poor, brave, generous, 
open-hearted peasants of Ireland ! How easy it is to 
shed human blood — how easy it is to persuade our- 
selves that it is our duty to do so — and that the deci- 
sion has cost us a severe struggle — how much, in all 
ages, have wounds and shrieks and tears been the 
cheap and vulgar resources of the rulers of mankind 
— how difficult and how noble it is to govern in kind- 
ness, and to found an empire upon the everlasting ba- 
sis of justice aud affection ! — But what do men call 
vigour ? To let loose hussars and to bring up artille- 
ry, to govern with lighted matches, and to cut, and 
push, and prime — I call this, not vigour, but the sloth 
of cruelty and ignorance. The vigour I love consists 
in finding out wherein subjects are aggrieved, in re- 
lieving them, in studying the temper and genius of a 
people, in consulting their prejudices, in selecting 
proper persons to lead and manage them, in the labo- 
rious, watchful, and difficult task of increasing public 
happiness by allaying each particular discontent. In 
this way Hoche pacified La Vendee— and in this way 
only will Ireland ever be subdued. But this, in the 
eyes of Mr. Perceval, is imbecility and meanness ; 
houses are not broken open — women are not insulted 
— the people seem all to be happy ; they are not rode 
over by horses, and cut by whips. Do you call this 
vigour? — Is this government? 



LETTER X. AND LAST. 

You must observe that all I have said of the effects 
which will be produced by giving salaries to the 
Catholic clergy only proceeds upon the supposition 
that the emancipation of the laity is effected : — with- 
out that, I am sure there is not a clergyman in Ireland 
who would receive a shilling from government ; he 
could not do so, without an entire loss of credit among 
the members of his own persuasion. 
What you say of the moderation of the Irish Protestant 
clergy in collecting tithes, is, I believe, strictly true. — 
Instead of collecting what the law enables them to 
collect, I believe they seldom or ever collect more 
than two-thirds ; and I entirely agree with you. that 
the abolition of agistment tithe in Ireland by a vote of 
the Irish House of Commons, and without any remune- 
ration to the church, was a most scandalous and Jaco- 
binical measure. I do not blame the Irish clergy ; but 
I submit to your common sense, if it is possible to ex- 
plain to an Irish peasant upon what principle of just- 
ice, or common sense, he is to pay every tenth potato 
in his little garden to a clergyman in whose religion 
nobody believes for twenty miles around him, and who 
has nothing to preach to but bare walls. It is true, if 
the tithes are bought up, the cottager must pay more 
rent to his landlord ; but the same thing, done in the 
shape of rent, is less odious than when it is done in 
the shape of tithe ; I do not want to take a shilling out 
of the pockets of the clergy, but to leave the substance 
of things, and to change their names. I cannot see 
the slightest reason why the Irish labourer is to be re- 
lieved from the real onus, or from any thing else, but 
the name of tithe. At present, he rents only nine- 
tenths of the produce of the land, which is all that be- 
longs to the owner ; this he has at the market price ; 
if the land-owner purchase the other tenth of the 
church, of course he has a right to make a correspond- 
ent advance upon his tenant. 

I very much doubt, if you were to lay open all civil 
offices to the Catholics and to grant salaries to their 
clergy, in the manner I have stated, if the Catholic 
laity would give themselves much trouble about the 
advance of their church ; for they would pay the same 
tithes under one system that they do under another.— 



330 



WORKS OF THE REV. SIDNEY SMITH, 



If you were to bring the Catholics into the daylight of ' 
the world, to the high situations of the army, the na- 
vy, and the bar, numbers of them would come over to 
the established church, and do as other people do ; — 
instead of that you set a mark of infamy upon them, 
rouse every passion of our nature in favour of their 
creed, and then wonder that men are blind to the fol- 
lies of the Catholic religion. There are hardly any 
instances of old and rich families among the Protest- 
ant dissenters ; when a man keeps a coach, and lives 
in good company, he comes to church, and gets asham- 
ed of the meeting-house ; if this is not the case with 
the father, it is almost always the case with the son. 
These things would never be so, if the dissenters were 
in practice as much excluded from all the concerns of 
civil life, as the Catholics are. It a rich young Cath- 
olic were in Parliament, he would belong to White's 
and to Brookes's, would keep race-horses, would walk 
up and down Pall Mall, be exonerated of his ready 
money and his constitution, become as totally devoid 
of morality, honesty, knowledge, and civility, as Pro- 
testant loungers in Pall Mall, and return home with a 
supreme contempt for Father O'Leary and Father O'- 
Callaghan. I am astonished at the madness of the 
Catholic clergy, in not perceiving that Catholic eman- 
cipation is Catholic infidelity ; that to entangle their 
people in the intrigues of a Protestant Parliament, and 
a Protestant court, is to insure the loss of every man 
of fashion and consequence in their community. The 
true receipt for preserving their religion is Mr. Perce- 
val's receipt for destroying it ; it is to deprive every 
rich Catholic of all the objects of secular ambition, to 
separate him from the Protestant, and to shut him up 
in his castle, with priests and relics. 

We are told, in answer to all our arguments, that 
this is not a fit period, — that a period of universal war 
is not the proper time for dangerous innovations in the 
constitution ; this is as much as to say, that the worst 
time for making friends is the period when you have 
made ..many enemies ; that it is the greatest of all er- 
rors to stop when you are breathless, and to lie down 
when you are fatigued Of one thing I am quite cer- 
tain : if the safety of Europe is once completely restor- 
ed, the Catholics may forever bid adieu to the slightest 
probability of effecting their object. Such men as 
hang about a court not only are deaf to the suggestions 
of mere justice, but they despise justice; they detest 
the word right ; the only word which rouses them is 
■peril • where they can oppress with impunity, they op- 
press for ever, and call it loyalty and wisdom. 

I am so far from conceiving the legitimate strength 
of the crown would be diminished by these abolitions 
of civil incapacities in consequence of religious opi- 
nions, that my only objection to the increase of reli- 
gious freedom is, that it would operate as a diminution 
of political freedom ; the power of the crown is so 
overbearing at this period, that almost the only steady 
opposers of its fatal influence are men disgusted by 
religious intolerance. Our establishments are so en- 
ormous, and so utterly disproportioned to our popula- 
tion, that every second or third man you meet in so- 
ciety gains something from the public ; my brother 
the commissioner — my nephew the police justice — 
purveyor of small beer to the army in Ireland — clerk 
of the mouth — yeoman to the left hand — these are the 
obstacles which common sense and justice have now 
to overcome. Add to this, that the king, old and in- 
firm, excites a principle of very amiable generosity in 
his favour; that he has led a good, moral, and reli- 
gious life, equally removed from profligacy and metho- 
distical hypocrisy ; that he has been a good husband, 
a good father, and a good master; that he dresses 
plain, loves hunting and farming, hates the French, 
and is, in all opinions and habits, quite English : — 
these feelings are heightened by the present situation 
of the world, and the yet unexploded clamour of 
Jacobinism. In short, from the various sources of in- 
terest, personal regard, and national taste, such a 
tempest of loyalty has set in upon the people, that 
the 47th proposition in Euclid might now be voted 
down with as much ease as any proposition in politics ; 
and, therefore, if Lord Hawkesbury hates the abstract 
truths of science as much as he hates concrete truth 



in human affairs, now is his time for getting rid of the 
multipli cation table, and passing a vote of censure 
upon the pretensions of the hypothenuse. Such is the 
history of English parties at this moment ; you cannot 
seriously suppose that the people care for such men as 
Lord Hawkesbury, Mr. Canning, and Mr. Perceval, 
on their own account ; you cannot really believe them 
to be so degraded as to look to their safety from a 
man who proposes to subdue Europe by keeping it 
without Jesuit's bark. The people, at present, have 
one passion, and but one — 

A Jove principium, Jovis omnia plena. 

They care no more for the ministers I have mentioned, 
than they do for those sturdy royalists who, for 60 J. 
per annum, stand behind his majesty's carriage, 
arrayed in scarlet and in gold. If the present minis, 
ters opposed the court instead of flattering it, they 
would not command twenty votes. 

Do not imagine, by these observations, that I am 
not loyal; without joining in the common cant of the 
best of kings, I respect the king most sincerely as a 
good man. His religion is better than the religion ot 
Mr. Perceval, his old morality very superior to the 
old morality of Mr. Canning, and I am quite certain 
he has a safer understanding than both of them put 
together. Loyalty, within the bounds of reason and 
moderation, is one of the great instruments of English 
happiness; but the love of the king may easily be- 
come more strong than the love of the kingdom, and 
we may lose sight of the public welfare in our exag- 
gerated admiration of him who is appointed to reign 
only for its promotion and support. I detest Jacobin- 
ism ; and if I am doomed to be a slave at all, I would 
rather be the slave of a king than a cobbler. God 
,save the king, you say, warms your heart like the 
sound of a trumpet. I cannot make use of so violent 
a metaphor ; but I am delighted to hear it, when it is 
the cry of genuine affection ; I am delighted to hear 
it, when they hail not only the individual man, bat the 
outward and living sign of all English blessings. 
These are noble feelings, and the heart of every good 
man must go with them ; but God save the king, in 
these times, too often means God save my pension 
and my place, God give my sisters an allowance out 
of the privy purse— make me clerk of the irons, let 
me survey the meltings, let me live upon the fruits of 
other men's industry, and fatten upon the plunder of 
the public. 

What is it possible to say to such a man as the gen- 
tleman of Hampstead, who really believes it feasible 
to convert the four million Irish Catholics to the Pro- 
testant religion, and considers this as the best remedy 
for the disturbed state of Ireland? It is not possible 
to answer such a man with arguments ; we must come 
out against him with beads, and a cowl, and push him 
into an hermitage. It is really such trash, that it is 
an abuse of the privilege of reasoning to reply to it. 
Such a project is Avell worthy the statesman who 
would bring the French to reason by keeping them 
without rhubarb, and exhibit to mankind the awful 
spectacle of a nation deprived of neutral salts. This 
is not the dream of a wild apothecary indulging in his 
own opium ; this is not the distempered fancy of a 
pounder of drugs, delirious from smallness of profits ; 
but it is the sober, deliberate, and systematic scheme 
of a man to whom the public safety is entrustsd, and 
whose appointment is considered by many as a mas- 
terpiece of political sagacity. What a sublime 
thought, that no purge can now be taken between the 
Weser and the Garonne ; that the bustling pestle is 
still, the canorous mortar mute, and the bowels of 
mankind locked up for fourteen degrees of latitude ! 
When, I should be curious to know, were all tho 
powers of crudity and flatulence fully explained to his 
majesty's ministers ? At what period was this great 
plan of conquest and constipation fully developed? 
In whose mind was the idea of destroying the pride, 
and the plasters of France first engendered? Without 
castor oil they might, for some months, to be sure 
have carried on a lingering war ; but can they do 
without bark ? Will the people live under a govern- 
ment where antimonial powders cannot be procured 



PETER PLYMLEY'S LETTERS. 



3S1 



Will they bear the loss of mercury ? * There's the 
rub.' Depend upon it, the absence of the materia 
medica will soon bring them to their senses, and the 
cry of Bourbon and bolus burst forth from the Baltic 
to the Mediterranean. 

You ask me for any precedent in our history where 
the oath of supremacy has been dispensed with. It 
was dispensed with to the Catholics of Canada, in 1774. 
They are only required to take a simple oath of alle- 
giance. The same, I believe, was the case in Corsica 
The reason of such exemption was obvious ; you could 
not possibly have retained either of these countries 
without it. And what did it signify, whether you 
retained them or not ? In cases where you might 
have been foolish without peril, you were wise ; 
when nonsense and bigotry threaten you with de- 
struction, it is impossible to bring you back to the 
alphabet of justice and common sense ; if men are to 
be" fools, I would rather they were fools in little mat- 
ters that in great ; dulness turned up with temerity, is 
a livery all the worse for the facings ; and the most 
tremendous of all things is the magnanimity of a 
dunce. 

It is not by any means necessary, as you contend, to 
repeal the Test Act if you give relief to the Catholic ; 
what the Catholics ask for is to be put on a footing 
with the Protestant dissenters, which would be done 
by repealing that part of the law which compels them 
to take the oath of supremacy and to make the decla- 
tion against t ran substantiation; they would then come 
into Parliament as all other dissenters are allowed to 
do, and the penal laws to which they were exposed for 
taking office would be suspended every year, as they 
have been for this half century past towards Protest- 
ant dissenters. Perhaps, after all, this is the best 
method, — to continue the persecuting law, and to sus- 
pend it every year, — a method which, while it effect- 
ually destroys the persecution itself, leaves to the 
great mass of mankind the exquisite gratification of 
supposing that they are enjoying some advantage from 
which a particular class of their fellow creatures are 
excluded. We manage the Corporation and Test Acts 
at present much in the same manner as if Ave were to 
persuade parish boys, who had been in the habit of 
beating an ass, to spare the animal, and beat the skin 
of an ass stuffed with straw ; this would preserve the 
semblance of tormenting without the reality, and keep 
boy and beast in good humour. 

How can you imagine that a provision for the Catho- 
lic clergy affects the fifth article of the Union ? Sure- 
ly I am preserving the Protestant church in Ireland, 
if I put it in a better condition than that in which it 
now is. A tithe proctor in Ireland collects his tithes 
with a blunderbuss, and carries his tenth hay-cock by 
storm, sword in hand; to give him equal value in a 
more pacific shape, cannot, I should imagine, be con- 
sidered as injurious to the church of Ireland ; and what 
right has that church to complain, if Parliament 
chooses to fix upon the empire the burthen of support- 
ing a double ecclesiastical establishment ? Are the 
revenues of the Irish Protestant clergy in the slightest 
degree injured by such a provision ? On the contrary, 
is it possible to confer a more serious benefit upon that 
church, than by quieting and contenting those who are 
at work for its destruction? 

It is impossible to think of the affairs of Ireland with- 
out being forcibly struck with the parallel of Hungary. 
Of her seven millions of inhabitants, one-half were Pro- 
testants, Calvinists, and Lutherans, many of the Greek 
Church, and many Jews ; such was the state of their 
religious dissensions, that Mahomet had often been 
called in to the aid of Calvin, and the cresent often 
glittered on the walls of Buda and of Presburg. At 
last in 1791, during the most violent crisis of disturb- 
ance, a diet was called, and by a great majority of 
voices a decree was passed, which secured to all the 
contending sects the fullest and freest exercise of reli- 
gious worship and education ; ordained (let it be heard 
in Hampstead) that churches and chapels should be 
erected for all on the most perfectly equal terms, that 
the Protestants of both confessions should depend upon 
their spiritual superiors alone, liberated them from 
swearing by the usual oath, ' the holy Virgin Mary, 



the saints and chosen of God ;' and then the decree 
adds, * public offices and honours, high or low, great or 
small, shall be given to natural born Hungarians who de- 
serve well of their country, and possess the other qualifi~ 
cations, let their religion be what it may.' Such was a 
line of policy pursued in a diet consisting of four hun- 
dred members, in a state whose form of government 
approaches nearer to our own than any other, having 
a Roman Catholic establishment of great wealth and 
power, and under the influence of one of the most bigo- 
ted Catholic courts of Europe. This measure has now 
the experience of eighteen years in its favour ; it has 
undergone a trial of fourteen years of revolution, such 
as the world never witnessed, and more than equal to 
a century less convulsed. What have been its effects ? 
When the French advanced like a torrent within a few 
days' march of Vienna, the Hungarians rose in a mass ; 
they formed what they called the sacred insurrection, 
to defend their sovereign, their rights and liberties, 
now common to all ; and the apprehension of their ap- 
proach dictated to the reluctant Bonaparte the imme- 
,diate signature of the treaty of Leoben : the Romish 
hierarchy of Hungary exists in all its former splendour 
and opulence ; never has the slightest attempt been 
made to diminish it ; and those revolutionary princi- 
ples, to which so large a portion of civilized Europe 
has been sacrificed, have here failed in making the 
smallest successful inroad. 

The whole history of this proceeding of the Hun- 
garian diet is so extraordinary, and such an admirable 
comment upon the Protestantism of Mr. Spencer Per- 
ceval, that I must compel you to read a few short 
extracts from the law itself: — ' The Protestants of 
both confessions shall, in religious matters, depend 
upon their own spiritual superiors alone. The Pro- 
testants may likewise sustain their trivial and gram- 
mar schools. The church dues which the Protestants 
have hitherto paid to the Catholic parish priests, 
schoolmasters, or other such officers, either in money, 
productions, or labour, shall in future entirely cease, 
and after three months from the publishing of this 
law, be no more any where demanded. In the building 
or repairing of churches, parsonage-houses and 
schools, the Protestants are not obliged to assist the 
Catholics with labour, nor the Catholics the Protest- 
ants. The pious foundations and donations of the 
Protestants which already exist, or which in future 
may be made for their churches, ministers, schools, 
and students, hospitals, orphan-houses, and poor, can- 
not be taken from them under any pretext, nor yet 
the care of them; but rather the unimpeded adminis- 
tration of them shall be entrusted to those from 
among them to whom it belongs, and those founda- 
tions which may have been taken from them under 
the last government, shall be returned to them without 
delay ; all affairs of the marriage of Protestants are 
left to their own consistories ; all landlords and mas- 
ters of families, under the penalty of public prosecu- 
tion, are ordered not to prevent their subjects and 
servants, whether they be Catholic or Protestant, from 
the observance of the festivals and ceremonies of their 
religion,' &c. &c. &c. — By what strange chances are 
mankind influenced ! A little Catholic barrister of 
Vienna might have raised the cry of no Protestantism, 
and Hungary would have panted for the arrival of a 
French army as much as Ireland does at this mo- 
ment ; arms would have been searched for ; Lutheran 
and Calvinist houses entered in the dead of the night ; 
and the strength of Austria exhausted in guarding a 
country from which, under the present liberal system, 
she may expect, in a moment of danger the most 
powerful aid ; and let it be remembered, that this 
memorable example of political wisdom took place at 
a period when many great monarchies were yet un- 
conquered in Europe ; in a country where the two 
religious parties were equal in number ; and where it 
is impossible to suppose indifference in the party 
which relinquished its exclusive privileges. Under 
all these circumstances, the measure was carried in 
the Hungarian diet by a majority of 280 to 120. In a 
few weeks we shall see every concession denied to the 
Catholics by a much larger majority of Protestants, at 
a moment when every other power is subjugated but 



WORKS OF THE REV. SIDNEY SMITH. 



ourselves, and in a country where the oppressed are 
four times as numerous as their oppressors. So much 
for the wisdom of our ancestors — so much for the 
nineteenth century — so much for the superiority of the 
English over all other nations of the continent. 

Are you not sensible, let me ask you, of the absurdi- 
ty of trusting the lowest Catholics with offices corres- 
pondent to their situation in life, and of denying such 
privilege to the higher ? A Catholic may serve in the 
militia, but a Catholic cannot come into Parliament ; 
in the latter case you suspect combination, and in the 
former case you suspect no combination ; you deliber- 
ately arm ten or twenty thousand of the lowest of the 
Catholic people ; — and the moment you come to a 
class of men whose education, honour, and talents, 
seem to render all mischief less probable, then you see 
the danger of employing a Catholic, and cling to your 
investigating tests and disabling laws. If you tell me 
you have enough of members of Parliament, and not 
enough of militia, without the Catholics, I beg leave 
to remind you, that by employing the physical force 
of any sect, at the same time when you leave them in 
a state of utter disaffection, you are not adding 
strength to your armies, but weakness and ruin: — if 
you want the vigour of their common people, you must 
not disgrace their nobility, and insult their priest- 
hood. 

I thought that the terror of the pope had been con- 
fined to the limits of the nursery, and merely employ- 
ed as a means to induce young master to enter into his 
small clothes with greater speed, and to eat his break- 
fast with greater attention to decorum. For these 
purposes, the name of the pope is admirable ; but why 
push it beyond 2 Why not leave to Lord Hawkesbu- 
ry all farther enumeration of the pope's powers ? For 
a whole century, you have been exposed to the enmity 
of France, and your succession was disputed in two 
rebellions ; what could the pope do at the period when 
there was a serious struggle, whether England should 
be Protestant or Catholic, and when the issue was 
completely doubtful ? Could the pope induce the Irish 
to rise in 1715 ? Could he induce them to rise in 1745 ? 
You had no Catholic enemy when half this island was 
in arms ; and what did the pope attempt in the last re- 
bellion in Ireland ? But if he had as much power over 
the minds of the Irish as Mr. Wilberforce has over 
the mind of a young Methodist, converted the preced- 
ing quarter, is this a reason why we are to disgust 
men, who may be acted upon in such a manner by a 
foreign power ? or is it not an additional reason why 
ive should raise up every barrier of affection and kind- 
ness against the mischief of foreign influence ? But 
the true answer is, the mischief does not exist. Gog 
and Magog have produced as much influence upon hu- 
man affairs, as the pope has done for this half century 
past ; and by spoiling him of his possessions, and de- 
grading him in the eyes of all Europe, Bonaparte has 
not taken quite the proper method of increasing his 
influence. 

But why not a Catholic king, as well as a Catholic 
member of Parliament, or of the cabinet? — Because it 
is probable that the one would be mischievous, and 
the other not. A Catholic king might struggle against 
the Protestantism of the country, and if the struggle 
was not successful, it would at least be dangerous ; 
but the efforts of any other Catholic would be quite in- 
significant, and his hope of success so small, that it is 
quite improbable the effort would ever be made ; my 
argument is, that in so Protestant a country as Great 
Britain, the character of her Parliaments and her cab- 
inet could not be changed by the few Catholics who 
would ever find their way to the one or the other. 
But the power of the crown is immeasurably greater 
than the power which the Catholics could obtain from 
any other species of authority in the state ; and it 
does not follow, because the lesser degree of power is 
innocent, that the greater should be so too. As for 
the stress you lay upon the danger of a Catholic chan- 
cellor, I have not the least hesitation in saying, that 
his appointment would not do a ten-thousandth part 
of the mischief to the English church that might be 
done by a methodistical chancellor of the true Clap- 
ham breed ; and I request Jo know, if it is really so 



very necessary that a chancellor should be of the re- 
ligion of the Church of England, how many chancel- 
lors you have had within the last century who have 
been bred up hi the Presbyterian religion? — And 
again, how many you have had who notoriously have 
been without any religion at all ? 

Why are you to suppose that eligibility and election 
are the same thing, and that all the cabinet will be 
Catholics, whenever all the cabinet may be Catholics ? 
You have a right, you say, to suppose an extreme 
case, and to argue upon it — so have I : and I will sup- 
pose that the hundred Irish members will one day 
come down in a body, and pass a law compelling the 
king to reside in Dublin. I will suppose that the 
Scotch members, by a similar stratagem, will lay Eng- 
land under a large contribution of meal and sulphur ; 
no measure is without objection, if you sweep the 
whole horizon for danger; it is not sufficient to tell 
me of what may happen, but you must show me a ra- 
tional probability that it will happen : after all, I 
might, contrary to my real opinion, admit all youi 
dangers to exist ; it is enough for me to contend that 
all other dangers taken together are not equal to the 
danger of losing Ireland from disaffection and inva- 
sion. 

I am astonished to see you, and many good and 
well-meaning clergymen beside you, painting the Cath- 
olics in such detestable colours; two-thirds, at least, 
of Europe are Catholics, — they are Christians, though 
mistaken Christians ; how can I possibly admit that 
any sect of Christians, and above all, that the oldest 
and most numerous .sect of Christians, are incapable of 
fulfilling the duties and relations of life; though I do 
differ from them in many particulars, God forbid I 
sholud give such a handle to infidelity, and subscribe 
to 'such blasphemy against our common religion ! 

Do you think mankind never change their opinions 
without formally expressing and confessing that 
change ? When you quote the decisions of ancient 
Catholic councils, are you prepared to defend all the 
decrees of English convocations and universities since 
the reign of Queen Elizabeth ? I could soon make you 
sick of your uncandid industry against the Catholics, 
and bring you to allow that it is better to forget 
times past, and to judge and be judged by present 
opinions and present practice. 

I must beg to be excused from explaining and re- 
futing all the mistakes about the Catholics made by 
my Lord Redesdale ; and I must do that nobleman the 
justice to say, that he has been treated with great dis- 
respect. Could any thing be more indecent than to 
make it a morning lounge in Dublin to call upon his 
lordship, and to cram him with Arabian-night stories 
about the Catholics ? Is this proper behaviour to the 
representative of majesty, the child of Themis, and 
the keeper of the conscience in West Britain ? — Who- 
ever reads the lptters of the Catholic bishops, in the 
appendix to Sir John Hippesly's very sensible book, 
will see to what an excess this practice must have been 
carried with the pleasing and Protestant nobleman 
whose name I have mentioned, and from thence I wish 
you to receive your answer about excommunication, 
and all the trash which is talked against the Catho- 
lics. 

A sort of notion has, by some means or another, 
crept into the world, that difference of religion would 
render men unfit to perform together the offices of 
common and civil life; that Brother Wood and Bro- 
ther Grose could not travel together the same circuit 
if they differed in creed, nor Cockell and Mingay be 
engaged in the same cause if Cockell was a Catholic 
and Mingay a Muggletonian. It is supposed that Hus- 
kisson and Sir Harry Englefield would squabble behind 
the speaker's chair about the Council of Lateran, and 
many a turnpike bill miscarry by the sarcastical con- 
troversies of Mr. Hawkins Brown and Sir JohnThock- 
morton upon the real presence. I wish I could see 
some of these symptoms of earnestness upon the subject 
of religion; but it really seems to me, that in the pre- 
sent .state of society, men no more think about inquir* 
ing concerning each other's faith than they do con- 
cerning the colour of each other's skins. There may 
have been times in England when the quarter sessions 



PETER PLYMLEY'S LETTERS. 



333 



would have been disturbed by the theological polem- 
ics ; but now, after a Catholic justice had once been 
seen on the bench, and it had been clearly ascertain- 
ed that he spoke English, had no tail, only a single 
row of teeth, and that he loved port- wine, — after all 
the scandalous and infamous reports of his physical 
confirmation had been clearly proved to be false, 
— he would be reckoned a jolly fellow, and very supe- 
rior in flavour to a sly Presbyterian. Nothing, in fact, 
can be more uncandid andunphilosophical* than to say 
that a man has a tail, because you cannot agree with 
him upon religious subjects; it appears to be ludi- 
crous, but I am convinced it has done infinite mischief 
to the Catholics, and made a very serious impression 
upon the minds of many gentlemen of large landed 
property. 

In talking of the impossibility of Catholics and Pro- 
testants living together under the same government, 
do you forget the cantons of Switzerland ? You might 
have seen there a Protestant congregation going into 
a church which had just been quitted by a Catholic 
congregation ; and I will venture to say that the Swiss 
Catholics were more bigoted to their religion than 
any people in the whole world. Did the kings of 
Prussia ever refuse to employ a Catholic ? Would 
Frederick the Great have rejected an able man on this 
account ? We have seen Prince Czartorinski, a Cath- 
olic sectretary of state in Russia; in former times, 
a Greek patriarch and an apostolic vicar acted toge- 
ther in the most perfect harmony in Venice ; and we 
have seen the Emperor of Germany in modern times 
entrusting the care of his person and the command of 
his guard to a Protestant prince, Ferdinand of Wir- 
temberg. But what are all these things to Mr. Perce- 
val ? He has looked at human nature from the top of 
Hampstead Hill, and has not a thought beyond the 
little sphere of his own vision. ' The snail,' say the 
Hindoos, < sees nothing but its own shell, and thinks 
it the grandest palace in the universe.' 

I now take a final leave of this subject of Ireland ; 
the only difficulty in discussing it is a want of re- 
sistance, a want of something difficult to unravel, and 
something dark to illumine ; to agitate such a ques- 
tion is to beat the air with a club, and cut down gnats 
with a scimitar ; it is a prostitution of industry, and a 
waste of strength. If a man says I have a good place, 
and I do not choose to lose it, this mode of arguing 
upon the Catholic question I can well understand ; but 
that any human being with an understanding two de- 
grees elevated above that of an Anabaptist preacher, 
should conscientiously contend for the expediency and 
propriety of leaving the Irish Catholics in their pre- 
sent state, and of subjecting us to such tremendous 
peril in the present condition of the world, it is utter- 
ly out of my power to conceive. Such a measure as 
the Catholic question is entirely beyond the com- 
mon game of politics ; it is a measure in which all 
parties ought to acquiesce, in order to preserve the 
place where and the stake for which they play. If 
Ireland is gone, where are jobs ? where are rever- 
sions ? where is my brother, Lord Arden ? where are 
my dear and near relations ? The game is up, and 
the speaker of the House of Commons will be sent as 
a present to the menagerie at Paris. We talk of wait- 
ing from particular considerations, as if centuries of 
joy and prosperity were before us ; in the next ten 
years our fate must be decided ; we shall know, long 
before that period, whether we can bear up against 
the miseries by which we are threatened, or not ; and 
yet, in the very midst of our crisis, we are enjoined to 
abstain from the most certain means of increasing our 
strength, and advised to wait for the remedy till the 
disease is removed by death or health. And now, in- 
stead of the plain and manly policy of increasing una- 

* Fide Lord Bacon, Locke, and Descartea. 



nimity at home, by equalizing rights and privileges, 
what is the ignorant, arrogant, and wicked system 
which has been pursued ? Such a career of madness 
and of folly was, I believe, never run in so short a 
period. The vigour of the ministry is like the vigour 
of a grave digger, — the tomb becomes more ready and 
more wide for every effort which they make. There 
is nothing which it is worth while either to take or to 
retain, and a constant train of ruinous expeditions has 
been kept up. Every Englishman felt proud of the 
integrity of his country ; the character of the country 
is lost for ever. It is of the utmost consequence to a 
commercial people at war with the greatest part of 
Europe, that there should be a free entry of neutrals 
into the enemy's ports ; the neutrals who carried our 
manufactures we have not only excluded, but we have 
compelled them to declare war against us. It was 
our interest to make a good peace, or convince our 
own people that it could not be obtained ; we have 
not made a peace, and we have convinced the people 
of nothing but of the arrogance of the foreign secre- 
tary ; and all this has taken place in the short space 
of a year, because a King's Bench barrister and a 
writer of epigrams, turned into ministers of slate, 
were determined to show country gentlemen that the 
late administration had no vigour. In the mean time 
commerce stands still, manufactures perish, Ireland 
is more and more irritated, India is threatened, fresh 
taxes are accumulated upon the wretched people, the 
war is carried on without it being possible to conceive 
any one single object which a rational being can pro- 
pose to himself by its continuation ; and in the midst 
of this unparalleled insanity, we are told that the con- 
tinent is to be reconquered by the want of rhubarb 
and plumbs.* A better spirit than exists in the Eng- 
lish people never existed in any people in the world ; 
it has been misdirected, and squandered upon party 
purposes in the most degrading and scandalous man- 
ner; they have been led to believe that they were 
benefiting the commerce of England by destroying the 
commerce of America, that they were defending their 
sovereign by perpetuating the bigoted oppression of 
their fellow-subject ; their rulers and their guides have 
told them that they would equal the vigour of France 
by equalling her atrocity ; and they have gone on 
wasting that opulence, patience, and courage, which, 
if husbanded by prudent and moderate counsels, might 
have proved the salvation of mankind. The same 
policy of turning the good qualities of Englishmen to 
their own destruction, which made Mr. Pitt omnipo- 
tent, continues his power to those who resemble him 
only in his vices ; advantage is taken of the loyalty of 
Englishmen, to make them meanly submissive ; their 
piety is turned into persecution, their courage into 
useless and obstinate contention ; they are plundered 
because they are ready to pay, and soothed into 
asinine stupidity because they are full of virtuous 
patience. If England must perish at last, so let it be ; 
that event is in the hands of God ; we must dry up 
our tears and submit. But that England should perish 
swindling and stealing ; that it should perish waging 
war against lazar-houses and hospitals ; that it should 
perish persecuting with monastic bigotry ; that it 
should calmly give itself up to be ruined by the flashy 
arrogance of one man, and the narrow fanaticism of 
another ; these events are within the power of human 
beings, and I did not think that the magnanimity 
of Englishmen would ever stoop to such degradations. 

Longumvale! 

PETER PLYMLEY. 

* Even Allen Park (accustomed as he has always been to 
be delighted by all administrations) says it is too bad ; and 
Hall and Morris are said to have actually blushed in one of 
the divisions. 



THE END. 



i 



68 4;ai 









* 































,C, v^> 



o 



fj- <? 



$ " 












< +J- 





















^v 






















































• 















Deacidified using the Bookkeeper process 
Neutralizing agent: Magnesium Oxide 
Treatment Date: May 2009 

PreservationTechnologies 

A WORLD LEADER IN COLLECTIONS PRESERVATION 

111 Tbomson Park Drive 
Cranberry Township, PA 16066 
(724)779-2111 



































































































i 






